Quote

Democracy gives the aura of legitimacy to acts that would otherwise be considered tyranny.

Walter E. Williams

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Walter E. Williams
Age: 84 †
Born: 1936
Born: March 31
Died: 2020
Died: December 1
Columnist
Economist
Journalist
Radio Personality
University Teacher
Philadelphia
Pennsylvania
Walter Williams
Walter Edward Williams
Acts
Considered
Otherwise
Gives
Democracy
Aura
Giving
Auras
Would
Legitimacy
Tyranny

More quotes by Walter E. Williams

Image
Discrimination is simply the act of choice. Scarcity requires us to choose scarcity is the cause of discrimination!
Walter E. Williams
Image
I prefer a thief to a Congressman. A thief will take your money and be on his way, but a Congressman will stand there and bore you with the reasons why he took it.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Maybe I'm overly pessimistic, but most of Africa is a continent without much hope for its people... What [Africa] needs, the West cannot give. ...what Africans need is personal liberty...[and] guarantees of private property rights and rule of law.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Always be suspicious of those who pretend to know it all, claim their way is the best way and are willing to force their way on the rest of us.
Walter E. Williams
Image
The true test of one's commitment to liberty and private property rights doesn't come when we permit people to be free to do those voluntary things with which we agree. The true test comes when we permit people to be free to do those voluntary things with which we disagree.
Walter E. Williams
Image
You can bet the rent money that whatever politicians do will end up harming consumers. ... Economic ignorance is to politicians what idle hands are to the devil. Both provide the workshop for the creation of evil.
Walter E. Williams
Image
According to the Institute for International Economics, trade barriers cost American consumers $80 billion a year or more than $1,200 per family.
Walter E. Williams
Image
If our country is to survive and prosper, we must summon the courage to condemn and reject the liberal agenda, and we had better do it soon.
Walter E. Williams
Image
When the Founders thought of democracy, they saw democracy in the political sphere - a sphere strictly limited by the Constitution's well-defined and enumerated powers given the federal government. Substituting democratic decision making for what should be private decision making is nothing less than tyranny dressed up.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Tariff policy beneficiaries are always visible, but its victims are mostly invisible. Politicians love this. The reason is simple: The beneficiaries know for whom to cast their ballots, and the victims don't know whom to blame for their calamity.
Walter E. Williams
Image
A recent study by David Green and Laura Casper, 'Delay, Denial and Dilution,' written for the London-based Institute of Economic Affairs, concludes that the World Health Organization calculated that Britain has as many as 25,000 unnecessary cancer deaths a year because of under-provision of care.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Vote for me. I'll use my office to take another American's money and give it to you.
Walter E. Williams
Image
The greatest percentage of poverty is found in female-headed households. Over 70 percent of female-headed households are poor. A large percentage of poor people are children (17 percent) fully 85 percent of black children living in poverty reside in a female-headed household.
Walter E. Williams
Image
But let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn belongs to you - and why?
Walter E. Williams
Image
Communism and socialism is [sic] seductive. It promises us that people will contribute according to ability and receive according to needs. Everybody is equal. Everybody has a right to decent housing, decent food and affordable medical care. History should have taught us that when we hear people talk this stuff - watch out!
Walter E. Williams
Image
Powerful government tends to draw into it people with bloated egos, people who think they know more than everyone else and have little hesitance in coercing their fellow man. Or as Nobel Laureate Friedrich Hayek said, in government, the scum rises to the top.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Whether we want to own up to it or not, the welfare state has done what Jim Crow, gross discrimination and poverty could not have done. It has contributed to the breakdown of the black family structure and has helped establish a set of values alien to traditional values of high moral standards, hard work and achievement.
Walter E. Williams
Image
When it came to the 2000 election, 84 percent of Ivy League faculty voted for Al Gore, 6 percent for Ralph Nader and 9 percent for George Bush. In the general electorate, the vote was split at 48 percent for Gore and Bush, and 3 percent for Nader.
Walter E. Williams
Image
We will not make inroads into the gun-violence problem until we acknowledge the underlying causes of youth behavior today, compared to yesterday. ... we must come to the realization that laws and regulations alone cannot produce a civilized society. It's morality that is society's first line of defense against uncivilized behavior.
Walter E. Williams
Image
Most Americans, who think Congress has a right to do anything for which they can get a majority vote, ignore the clearly written constitutional restraints on Congress.
Walter E. Williams