Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hooverwas the 31st President of the United States. He was a professional mining engineer and was raised as a Quaker. A Republican, Hoover served as head of the U.S. Food Administration during World War I, and became internationally known for humanitarian relief efforts in war-time Belgium. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business under the rubric "economic modernization."...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionUS President
Date of Birth10 August 1874
CityWest Branch, IA
CountryUnited States of America
Herbert Hoover quotes about
We supported the cooperative movement among farmers. The movement was still young and stubbornly opposed to the commercial distributors. I believed it to be one of the most helpful undertakings, for according to my social theories any organization run by citizens for their own welfare is preferable to the same action by the government.
You cannot extend the mastery of government over the daily life of a people without somewhere making it master of people's souls and thoughts.... Every step in that direction poisons the very roots of liberalism. It poisons political equality, free speech, free press, and equality of opportunity. It is the road not to more liberty but to less liberty.
I am firmly opposed to the government entering into any business the major purpose of which is competition with our citizens... for the Federal Government deliberately to go out to build up and expand... a power and manufacturing business is to break down the initiative and enterprise of the American people; it is the destruction of equality of opportunity amongst our people, it is the negation of the ideals upon which our civilization has been based.
Bureaucracy is ever desirous of spreading its influence and its power. You cannot extend the mastery of the government over the daily working life of a people without at the same time making it the master of the people's souls and thoughts.
If the law is upheld only by government officials, then all law is at an end.
The sole function of Government is to bring about a condition of affairs favorable to the beneficial development of private enterprise.
Freedom requires that government keep the channels of competition and opportunity open, prevent monopolies, economic abuse and domination.
Whatever doubt there may be as to the quality or purpose of our free speech we certainly have ample volumes in production.
Governments know that the life of the world cannot be saved if the soul of the world is allowed to be lost.
I am willing to pledge myself that if the time should ever come that the voluntary agencies of the country together with the localand state governments are unable to find resources with which to prevent hunger and sufferingI will ask the aid of every resource of the Federal Government.... I have the faith in the American people that such a day will not come.
Self-government can succeed only through an instructed electorate.
All progress and growth is a matter of change, but change must be growth within our social and government concepts if it should not destroy them.