Barry Goldwater quotes

Barry Goldwater was an American politician and five-term U.S. Senator from Arizona, widely regarded as a leader of the conservative movement in the United States. His 1964 presidential campaign helped redefine the Republican Party and influenced American politics for decades. He is remembered for his principled stances and for shaping modern conservative ideology. Here are 121 of his quotes:

Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.

Barry Goldwater

Equality, rightly understood, as our founding fathers understood it, leads to liberty and to the emancipation of creative differences. Wrongly understood, as it has been so tragically in our time, it leads first to conformity and then to despotism.

Barry Goldwater

The income tax created more criminals than any other single act of government.

Barry Goldwater

You don't need to be straight to fight and die for your country. You just need to shoot straight.

Barry Goldwater

I think any man in business would be foolish to fool around with his secretary. If it's somebody else's secretary, fine.

Barry Goldwater

Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.

Barry Goldwater

Everyone knows that gays have served honorably in the military since at least the time of Julius Caesar.

Barry Goldwater

Nixon was the most dishonest individual I have ever met in my life. He lied to his wife, his family, his friends, his colleagues in the Congress, lifetime members of his own political party, the American people and the world.

Barry Goldwater

Hubert Humphrey talks so fast that listening to him is like trying to read Playboy magazine with your wife turning the pages.

Barry Goldwater

I won't say that the papers misquote me, but I sometimes wonder where Christianity would be today if some of those reporters had been Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Barry Goldwater

Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.

Barry Goldwater

Having spent 37 years of my life in the military as a reservist, and never having met a gay in all of that time, and never having even talked about it in all those years, I just thought, why the hell shouldn't they serve? They're American citizens. As long as they're not doing things that are harmful to anyone else... So I came out for it.

Barry Goldwater

It's a great country, where anybody can grow up to be president... except me.

Barry Goldwater

Most Americans have no real understanding of the operations of the international moneylenders... the accounts of the Federal Reserve have never been audited. It operates outside the control of Congress and... manipulates the credit of the United States.

Barry Goldwater

I think every good Christian ought to kick Falwell right in the ass.

Barry Goldwater

Where is the politician who has not promised to fight to the death for lower taxes- and who has not proceeded to vote for the very spending projects that make tax cuts impossible?

Barry Goldwater

I could have ended the war in a month. I could have made North Vietnam look like a mud puddle.

Barry Goldwater

If you don't mind smelling like peanut butter for two or three days, peanut butter is darn good shaving cream.

Barry Goldwater

To my mind the single essential element on which all discoveries will be dependent is human freedom.

Barry Goldwater

I'm the most underdog underdog there is.

Barry Goldwater

If everybody in this town connected with politics had to leave town because of chasing women and drinking, you would have no government.

Barry Goldwater

When I'm not a politician, I'll be dead.

Barry Goldwater