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The best form of government is that which is most likely to prevent the greatest sum of evil.

To take an analogy: if we say that a democratic government is the best kind of government, we mean that it most completely fulfills the highest function of a government - the realisation of the will of the people.

I prefer, in a word, the republican system, because it comes up more nearly to God's system.

Here, also, has been evolved the form of government consistent with the largest possible civil liberty.

The thought about Republicans is, we're supposed to be Jeffersonian. That government governs the best that governs the least.

Smaller government, more individual responsibility, more individual control creates more Republicans. More state power and ownership and control and top-down decision-making creates more Democrats.

The Government of the absolute majority instead of the Government of the people is but the Government of the strongest interests; and when not efficiently checked, it is the most tyrannical and oppressive that can be devised.

Now one of two things is true: Either a republic is a desirable form of government, or else it is not.

The problem to solve is, whether a single or a double government would be most advantageous; and, in considering that point, I am met by this difficulty - that I cannot see that the present form of government is a double government at all.

Democracy is not so much a form of government as a set of principles.