William F. Buckley quotes

William F. Buckley was an American political commentator, author, and founder of National Review magazine. His eloquent advocacy helped shape the modern conservative movement in the United States. He remains a pivotal figure in twentieth-century political thought and public discourse. Here are 68 of his quotes:

I get satisfaction of three kinds. One is creating something, one is being paid for it and one is the feeling that I haven't just been sitting on my ass all afternoon. (William F. Buckley)
The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry. View quote
William F. Buckley
Idealism is fine, but as it approaches reality, the costs become prohibitive. View quote
William F. Buckley
I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said. View quote
William F. Buckley
I would like to take you seriously, but to do so would affront your intelligence. View quote
William F. Buckley
Life can't be all bad when for ten dollars you can buy all the Beethoven sonatas and listen to them for ten years. View quote
William F. Buckley
Liberals, it has been said, are generous with other peoples' money, except when it comes to questions of national survival when they prefer to be generous with other people's freedom and security. View quote
William F. Buckley
If you had a European prime minister who experienced what we've experienced it would be expected that he would retire or resign. View quote
William F. Buckley
It was rumored, in 1946, that the hangman in Nuremberg adjusted the nooses of some of the condemned to magnify the pain of suffocation. Such sadism was not called for then and is not called for now. But if fornication is wrong, there is no denying that it can bring pleasure. The death of Saddam Hussein at rope's end brings a pleasure that is undeniable, and absolutely chaste in its provenance. View quote
William F. Buckley
Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could. View quote
William F. Buckley
There is an inverse relationship between reliance on the state and self-reliance. (William F. Buckley)
Government can't do anything for you except in proportion as it can do something to you. View quote
William F. Buckley
The superstition that the hounds of truth will rout the vermin of error seems, like a fragment of Victorian lace, quaint, but too brittle to be lifted out of the showcase. View quote
William F. Buckley
Treatment is not now available for almost half of those who would benefit from it. Yet we are willing to build more and more jails in which to isolate drug users even though at one-seventh the cost of building and maintaining jail space and pursuing, detaining, and prosecuting the drug user, we could subsidize commensurately effective medical care and psychological treatment. View quote
William F. Buckley
Those who suffer from the abuse of drugs have themselves to blame for it. This does not mean that society is absolved from active concern for their plight. It does mean that their plight is subordinate to the plight of those citizens who do not experiment with drugs but whose life, liberty, and property are substantially affected by the illegalization of the drugs sought after by the minority. View quote
William F. Buckley
They are men and women who tend to believe that the human being is perfectible and social progress predictable, and that the instrument for effecting the two is reason; that truths are transitory and empirically determined; that equality is desirable and attainable through the action of state power; that social and individual differences, if they are not rational, are objectionable, and should be scientifically eliminated; that all people and societies strive to organize themselves upon a rationalist and scientific paradigm. View quote
William F. Buckley
I am, I fully grant, a phenomenon, but not because of any speed in composition. I asked myself the other day, "Who else, on so many issues, has been so right so much of the time?" View quote
William F. Buckley
Though liberals do a great deal of talking about hearing other points of view, it sometimes shocks them to learn that there are other points of view. View quote
William F. Buckley
We are so concerned to flatter the majority that we lose sight of how very often it is necessary, in order to preserve freedom for the minority, let alone for the individual, to face that majority down. View quote
William F. Buckley
A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it. View quote
William F. Buckley
Everything I do and say and the way I do and say it annoys me. (William F. Buckley)
I am obliged to confess I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University. View quote
William F. Buckley
Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views. View quote
William F. Buckley
They told me if I voted for Goldwater, he would get us into a war in Vietnam. Well, I voted for Goldwater and that's what happened. View quote
William F. Buckley
I've always subconsciously looked out for the total Christian and when I found him he turned out to be a non-practicing Jew. View quote
William F. Buckley