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Human nature must have come much nearer perfection than it is now, or will be in many generations, to exclude from such a control prejudice, selfishness, ambition, and injustice.

Elihu Root

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Elihu Root
Age: 91 †
Born: 1845
Born: February 15
Died: 1937
Died: February 7
Diplomat
Former U.S. Senator
Lawyer
Politician
Clinton
Oneida County
New York
Hon. Elihu Root
Human
Selfishness
Humans
Prejudice
Come
Injustice
Many
Ambition
Must
Perfection
Much
Generations
Control
Exclude
Nature
Nearer

More quotes by Elihu Root

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The line of least resistance in the progress of civilization is to make that theoretical postulate real by the continually increasing force of the world's public opinion.
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It is to be observed that every case of war averted is a gain in general, for it helps to form a habit of peace, and community habits long continued become standards of conduct.
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Gradually, everything that happens in the world is coming to be of interest everywhere in the world, and, gradually, thoughtful men and women everywhere are sitting in judgment upon the conduct of all nations.
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The framers of the Constitution realized that . . . there needed to be some guardian of the sober second thought, and so they created the Senate to fulfill that high and vitally important duty.
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Claims of right and insistence upon obligations may depend upon treaty stipulations, or upon the rules of international law, or upon the sense of natural justice applied to the circumstances of a particular case, or upon disputed facts.
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The methods of peace propaganda which aim at establishing peace doctrine by argument and by creating a feeling favorable to peace in general seem to fall short of reaching the springs of human action and of dealing with the causes of the conduct which they seek to modify.
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War was forced upon mankind in his original civil and social condition.
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Honest people, mistakenly believing in the justice of their cause, are led to support injustice.
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Secretary of War Stanton used to get out of patience with Lincoln because he was all the time pardoning men who ought to be shot.
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Nobody knows through how many thousands of years fighting men have made a place for themselves while the weak and peaceable have gone to the wall.
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In the first place, when there is a policy of intentional aggression, inspired by a desire to get possession of the territory or the trade of another country, right or wrong, a pretext is always sought.
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I observe that there are two entirely different theories according to which individual men seek to get on in the world. One theory leads a man to pull down everybody around him in order to climb up on them to a higher place. The other leads a man to help everybody around him in order that he may go up with them.
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The limitation upon this mode of promoting peace lies in the fact that it consists in an appeal to the civilized side of man, while war is the product of forces proceeding from man's original savage nature.
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Human life is held in much higher esteem, and the taking of it, whether in private quarrel or by judicial procedure, is looked upon much more seriously than it was formerly.
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It is only through the power of association that those of any calling exercise due influence in their communities.
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To deal with the true causes of war one must begin by recognizing as of prime relevancy to the solution of the problem the familiar fact that civilization is a partial, incomplete, and, to a great extent, superficial modification of barbarism.
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About half the practice of a decent lawyer is telling would-be clients that they are damned fools and should shut up.
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The worst, the hardest, the most disagreeable thing that you may have to do may be the thing that counts most, because it is the hard discipline, and it alone, that makes possible the highest efficiency.
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The theoretical postulate of all diplomatic discussion between nations is the assumed willingness of every nation to do justice.
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The point of departure of the process to which we wish to contribute is the fact that war is the natural reaction of human nature in the savage state, while peace is the result of acquired characteristics.
Elihu Root