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. — William F. Buckley

Some of my instincts are reprehensible. — William F. Buckley

Conservatives should be adamant about the need for the reappearance of Judeo–Christianity in the public square. — 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. — William F. Buckley

A society is not ‘free’ merely because the freedoms the people are doing away with are those they voted at the last election to do without. — William F. Buckley

People are beginning to wish that the voters had been given breathometer tests when they voted in the present government. — William F. Buckley

History is but the polemics of the victor. — William F. Buckley

All that is good is not embodied in the law; and all that is evil is not proscribed by the law. A well–disciplined society needs few laws; but it needs strong mores. — William F. Buckley

I mean to live my life an obedient man, but obedient to God, subservient to the wisdom of my ancestors; never to the authority of political truths arrived at yesterday at the voting booth. — William F. Buckley

You cannot paint the Mona Lisa by assigning one dab each to a thousand painters. — William F. Buckley

It is not a sign of arrogance for the king to rule. That is what he is there for. — William F. Buckley

He [Cassius Clay] became a Black Muslim, which is a pseudo–religion for unbright neurotics who feel the need to hate all white people. — William F. Buckley

We love your adherence to democratic principles. — William F. Buckley

Norman Mailer decocts matters of the first philosophical magnitude from an examination of his own ordure, and I am not talking about his books. — William F. Buckley

I profoundly believe it takes a lot of practice to become a moral slob. — William F. Buckley

No one since the Garden of Eden–which the serpent forsook in order to run for higher office–has imputed to politicians great purity of motive. — William F. Buckley

Scientists are people who build the Brooklyn Bridge and then buy it. — William F. Buckley

The amount of money and of legal energy being given to prosecute hundreds of thousands of Americans who are caught with a few ounces of marijuana makes no sense. — William F. Buckley

We view our atomic arsenal as proudly and as devotedly as any pioneer ever viewed his flintlock hanging over the mantel as his children slept, and dreamed. — William F. Buckley

The police can’t use clubs or gas or dogs. I suppose they will have to use poison ivy. — 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. — William F. Buckley

France believes in armed intervention by America only when the intervention is in France to rescue France from occupation by other powers. — William F. Buckley

I would like to take you seriously but to do so would affront your intelligence. — William F. Buckley Jr.

Reagan is both too fatalistic and too modest to be a crudaser. He doesn’t have that darkness around the eyes of a George McGovern. — William F. Buckley

Louis Kelso of San Francisco, a lawyer–economist, has for years felt that he has a radical answer to the problem. — William F. Buckley

The more complicated and powerful the job, the more rudimentary the preparation for it. — William F. Buckley

Government can’t do anything for you except in proportion as it can do something to you. — William F. Buckley

The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry. — William F. Buckley