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Nobody ever left the presidency with less regret, less disappointment, fewer heart burnings, or any general content with the result of his term (in his own heart, I mean) than I do. Full of difficulty and trouble at first, I now find myself on smooth waters and under bright skies.

Rutherford B. Hayes

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Rutherford B. Hayes
Age: 70 †
Born: 1822
Born: October 4
Died: 1893
Died: January 17
19Th U.S. President
Lawyer
Military Officer
Politician
Statesperson
Delaware
Ohio
Rutherford Birchard Hayes
Rutherford Hayes
R. B. Hayes
President Hayes
Heart
Less
Regret
Smooth
Water
Result
Fewer
Left
General
Disappointment
Find
Nobody
Bright
Ever
Trouble
Burning
Burnings
Firsts
Results
Content
Skies
First
Full
Difficulty
Waters
Mean
Term
Sky
Presidency

More quotes by Rutherford B. Hayes

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I too mean to be out of politics. The ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment gives me the boon of equality before the law, terminates my enlistment, and discharges me cured.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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The most noticeable weakness of Congressmen is their timidity. They fear the use to be made of their record. They are afraid ofmaking enemies. They do not vote according to their convictions from fear of consequences.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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All appointments hurt. Five friends are made cold or hostile for every appointment no new friends are made. All patronage is perilous to men of real ability or merit. It aids only those who lack other claims to public support.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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Youth, however, is a defect that she is fast getting away from and may perhaps be entirely rid of before I shall want her.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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The unrestricted competition so commonly advocated does not leave us the survival of the fittest. The unscrupulous succeed best in accumulating wealth.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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What Congress and the popular sentiment approve is rarely defeated by reason of constitutional objections. I trust the measure will turn out well. It is a great relief to me. Defeat in this way, after a full and public hearing before this [Electoral] Commission, is not mortifying in any degree, and success will be in all respects more satisfactory.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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As friends go it is less important to live.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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My policy is trust peace and to put aside the bayonet.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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We all agree that neither the Government nor political parties ought to interfere with religious sects. It is equally true that religious sects ought not to interfere with the Government or with political parties. We believe that the cause of good government and the cause of religion both suffer by all such interference.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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Virtue is defined to be mediocrity, of which either extreme is vice.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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I hope you will be benefitted by your churchgoing. Where the habit does not Christianize, it generally civilizes. That is reason enough for supporting churches, if there were no higher.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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The reform [of the civil service] should be thorough, radical, and complete.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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I would honor the man who give to his country a good newspaper.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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The best religion the world has ever known is the religion of the Bible. It builds up all that is good.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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My policy is trust, peace, and to put aside the bayonet. I do not think the wise policy is to decide contested elections in the States by the use of the national army.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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It is a government of the people by the people for the people no longer it is a government of corporations by corporations for corporations
Rutherford B. Hayes
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The best hopes of any community rest upon that class of its gifted young men who are not encumbered with large possessions.... I now speak of extensive scholarship and ripe culture in science and art.... It is not large possessions, it is large expectations, or rather large hopes, that stimulate the ambition of the young.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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For character, to prepare for the inevitable I recommend selections from [Ralph Waldo] Emerson. His writings have done for me far more than all other reading.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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He serves his party best who serves the country best.
Rutherford B. Hayes
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Wars will remain while human nature remains. I believe in my soul in cooperation, in arbitration but the soldier's occupation we cannot say is gone until human nature is gone.
Rutherford B. Hayes