Margaret Thatcher Quotes

262 Sourced Quotes

The habit of ubiquitous interventionism, combining pinprick strikes by precision weapons with pious invocations of high principle, would lead us into endless difficulties. Interventions must be limited in number and overwhelming in their impact.

Margaret Thatcher
Freedom under the law must never be taken for granted.

Margaret Thatcher
We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the State in Britain only to see them reimposed at European level, with a European super-State exercising a new dominance from Brussels.

Margaret Thatcher
I might have preferred iron, but bronze will do. It won't rust. And, this time I hope, the head will stay on.

Margaret Thatcher
But the whole history of America is quite different from Europe. People went there to get away from the intolerance and constraints of life in Europe. They sought liberty and opportunity; and their strong sense of purpose has over two centuries, helped create a new unity and pride in being American.

Margaret Thatcher
Most of us have stopped using silver for everyday.

Margaret Thatcher
Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.

Margaret Thatcher
Let us make this a country safe to work in. Let us make this a country safe to walk in. Let us make it a country safe to grow up in. Let us make it a country safe to grow old in. And it says, above all, may this land of ours, which we love so much, find dignity and greatness and peace again.

Margaret Thatcher
We got a really good consensus during the last election. Consensus behind my convictions.

Margaret Thatcher
To me, consensus seems to be: the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values, and policies in search of something in which no one believes, but to which no one objects; the process of avoiding the very issues that need to be solved, merely because you cannot get agreement on the way ahead. What great cause would have been fought and won under the banner 'I stand for consensus'?

Margaret Thatcher
Given time, it would have been seen as one of the most far-reaching and beneficial reforms ever made in the working of local government.
Of the poll tax

Margaret Thatcher
We have to see that the spirit of the South Atlantic—the real spirit of Britain—is kindled not only by war but can now be fired by peace. We have the first prerequisite. We know that we can do it—we haven't lost the ability. That is the Falklands Factor.

Margaret Thatcher
The Russians are bent on world dominance, and they are rapidly acquiring the means to become the most powerful imperial nation the world has seen. The men in the Soviet Politburo do not have to worry about the ebb and flow of public opinion. They put guns before butter, while we put just about everything before guns.

Margaret Thatcher
I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.

Margaret Thatcher
All corporatism – even when practised in societies where hard work, enterprise and cooperation are as highly valued as in Korea – encourages inflexibility, discourages individual accountability, and risks magnifying errors by concealing them.

Margaret Thatcher
At one end of the spectrum are the terrorist gangs within our borders, and the terrorist states which finance and arm them. At the other are the hard left operating inside our system, conspiring to use union power and the apparatus of local government to break, defy and subvert the law.

Margaret Thatcher
There are still people in my party who believe in consensus politics. I regard them as Quislings, as traitors... I mean it.

Margaret Thatcher
The trouble with you John, is that your spine does not reach your brain.

Margaret Thatcher
The truths of the Judaic-Christian tradition, are infinitely precious, not only, as I believe, because they are true, but also because they provide the moral impulse which alone can lead to that peace, in the true meaning of the word, for which we all long.. . . There is little hope for democracy if the hearts of men and women in democratic societies cannot be touched by a call to something greater than themselves.

Margaret Thatcher
We shall not be diverted from our course. To those waiting with bated breath for that favourite media catch-phrase, the U-turn, I have only this to say. 'You turn if you want to; the lady's not for turning.'

Margaret Thatcher
But if Saddam had been in a position credibly to threaten America or any of its allies – or the coalition's forces – with attack by missiles with nuclear warheads, would we have gone to the Gulf at all?

Margaret Thatcher
Just rejoice at that news and congratulate our forces and the marines... Rejoice.

Margaret Thatcher
The desire to win is born in most of us. The will to win is a matter of training. The manner of winning is a matter of honour.

Margaret Thatcher
On becoming Prime Minister:
I would just like to remember some words of St Francis of Assisi which I think are really just particularly apt at the moment – 'Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; where there is error may we bring truth; where there is doubt, may we bring faith; and where there is despair, may we bring hope.'

Margaret Thatcher
I stand before you tonight in my red chiffon evening gown, my face softly made up, my fair hair gently waved…the Iron Lady of the Western World! Me? A cold war warrior? Well, yes—if that is how they wish to interpret my defence of values and freedoms fundamental to our way of life.

Margaret Thatcher