“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Absolute power demoralizes.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Liberty becomes a question of morals more than of politics.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Liberty is the harmony between the will and the law.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Towns were the nursery of freedom.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Political atheism: End justifies the means. This is still the most widespread of all the opinions inimical to liberty.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Moral precepts are constant through the ages and not obedient to circumstances.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Self-preservation and self-denial, the basis of all political economy.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Bureaucracy is undoubtedly the weapon and sign of a despotic government, inasmuch as it gives whatever government it serves, despotic power.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Bureaucracy tries to establish so many administrative maxims that the minister is as narrowly controlled and guided as the judge.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Men cannot be made good by the state, but they can easily be made bad. Morality depends on liberty.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Democracy generally monopolizes and concentrates power.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
“Americans dreaded democracy and contrived their constitution against it.”
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)
"The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities."
—Lord Acton (1834-1902)