corruption

There is a life that is worth living now as it was worth living in the former days, and that is the honest life, the useful life, the unselfish life, cleansed by devotion to an ideal. There is a battle worth fighting now as it was worth fighting then, and that is the battle for justice and equality: to make our city and our state free in fact as well as in name; to break the rings that strangle real liberty, and to keep them broken; to cleanse, so far as in our power lies, the fountains of our national life from political, commercial, and social corruption; to teach our sons and daughters, by precept and example, the honor of serving such a country as America. That is work worthy of the finest manhood and womanhood.

Corrupt politicians make the other ten percent look bad.

Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints.

If absolute power corrupts absolutely, does absolute powerlessness make you pure?

There will be selfishness and greed and corruption and narrowness and intolerance in the world tomorrow and tomorrow's tomorrow. But pray God we may have the courage and the wisdom and the vision to raise a definite standard that will appeal to the best that is in man, and then strive mightily toward that goal.

Our worst enemies here are not the ignorant and simple, however cruel; our worst enemies are the intelligent and corrupt.

Power does not corrupt men. Fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power.

Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.

Beauty is like summer fruits which are easy to corrupt and cannot last.