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Home  »  Respectfully Quoted  »  Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)

Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.

 
NUMBER: 2025
AUTHOR: Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
QUOTATION: Do the day’s work. If it be to protect the rights of the weak, whoever objects, do it. If it be to help a powerful corporation better to serve the people, whatever the opposition, do that. Expect to be called a stand-patter, but don’t be a stand-patter. Expect to be called a demagogue, but don’t be a demagogue. Don’t hesitate to be as revolutionary as science. Don’t hesitate to be as reactionary as the multiplication table. Don’t expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong. Don’t hurry to legislate. Give administration a chance to catch up with legislation.
ATTRIBUTION: CALVIN COOLIDGE, speech to the Massachusetts state Senate on being elected its president, Boston, Massachusetts, January 7, 1914.—Coolidge, Have Faith in Massachusetts, pp. 7–8 (1919).
SUBJECTS: Work