Edward Abbey - Government Quotes

18 Sourced Quotes

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A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.

Edward Abbey
All governments need enemies. How else to justify their existence?

Edward Abbey
The national parks belong to everyone. To the people. To all of us. The government keeps saying so and maybe, in this one case at least, the government is telling the truth. Hard to believe, but possible.

Edward Abbey
Government: If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

Edward Abbey
Terrorism: deadly violence against humans and other living things, usually conducted by government against its own people.

Edward Abbey
Say what you like about my bloody murderous government,' I says, 'but don't insult me poor bleedin' country.

Edward Abbey
All forms of government are pernicious, including good government.

Edward Abbey
No tyranny is so irksome as petty tyranny: the officious demands of policemen, government clerks, and electromechanical gadgets.

Edward Abbey
War: First day in the U.S. Army, the government placed a Bible in my left hand, a bayonet in the other.

Edward Abbey
The moral duty of the free writer is to begin his work at home: to be a critic of his own community, his own country, his own government, his own culture. The more freedom the writer possesses, the greater the moral obligation to play the role of critic.

Edward Abbey
As war and government prove, insanity is the most contagious of diseases.

Edward Abbey
When guns are outlawed, only the Government will have guns. The Government - and a few outlaws. If that happens, you can count me among the outlaws.

Edward Abbey
Representative government has broken down. Our politicians represent not the people who vote for them but the commercial interests who finance their election campaigns. We have the best politicians that money can buy.

Edward Abbey
Government should be weak, amateurish and ridiculous. At present, it fulfills only a third of the role.

Edward Abbey
A true libertarian supports free enterprise, opposes big business; supports local self-government, opposes the nation-state; supports the National Rifle Association, opposes the Pentagon.

Edward Abbey
In the Soviet Union, government controls industry. In the United States, industry controls government. That is the principal structural difference between the two great oligarchies of our time.

Edward Abbey
Nearly all of Latin America, from Chile to Mexico, is one long rack of torture. Financed, equipped, and refined by the U.S. government.

Edward Abbey
The purpose and function of government is not to preside over change but to prevent change. By political methods when unavoidable, by violence when convenient.

Edward Abbey