Dean Acheson Quotes

I learned from the example of my father that the manner in which one endures what must be endured is more important than the thing that must be endured.

The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time. The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time.

I think Churchill is right, the only thing to be said for democracy is that there is nothing else that's any better, and therefore he used to say, Tyranny tempered by assassination, but lots of assassination. People say, If the Congress were more representative of the people it would be better. I say the Congress is too damn representative. It's just as stupid as the people are; just as uneducated, just as dumb, just as selfish.

Always remember that the future comes one day at a time.

Brains are no substitute for judgement.

No people in history have ever survived who thought they could protect their freedom by making themselves inoffensive to their enemies.

Great Britain has lost an Empire and has not yet found a role.

A memorandum is written not to inform the reader but to protect the writer.

Like apples in a barrel infected by one rotten one, the corruption of Greece would infect Iran and all to the east. It would also carry infection to Africa through Asia Minor and Egypt, and to Europe through Italy and France, already threatened by the strongest domestic Communist parties in Western Europe. The Soviet Union was playing one of the greatest gambles in history at minimal cost. It did not need to will all the possibilities. Even one or two offered immense gains. We and we alone were in a position to break up the play.

Negotiation in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties more anxious to agree than to disagree.

Greatness is a quality of character and is not the result of circumstances.

You can't argue with a river, it isgoing to flow.You can dam it up?put it to useful purposes?deflect it, but you can't argue with it.

The future comes one day at a time [so don't fear and try to solve all the worries and problems of the future today].

The great corrupter of public men is the ego - corrupter because distracter. Wealth, sensuality, power cannot hold a candle to it. Looking in the mirror distracts one's attention from the problem.

I have a curious and apprehensive feeling as I watch JFK that he is sort of an Indian snake charmer.

I have almost invariably found that charm is used as a substitute for intelligence in persons of both sexes. Thus, I have always been and will remain wary of it.

The limitations imposed by democratic political practices makes it difficult to conduct our foreign affairs in the national interest.

Great Britain has lost an Empire and not yet found a role. The attempt to playa separate power rolethat is, a role apart from Europe, based on a special relationship with the United States, on being the head of the Commonwealthis about to be played out. Her Majesty's Government is now attempting, wisely in my opinion, to re-enter Europe.

How could the USA champion individual freedom in the world generally while denying it to an important minority in its own country.

Vietnam was worse than immoral - it was a mistake.

To leave positions of great responsibility and authority is to die a little, but the time comes when that must be faced.

The test for aid to poor nations is therefore whether it makes them capable of being productive. If it fails to do so, it is likely to make them even poorer in the - not so very - long run.

The trouble with a free market economy is that it requires so many policemen to make it work.

With a nation, as with a boxer, one of the greatest assurances of safety is to add reach to power.

No man comes out of his own memorandum of conversation looking second best.