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The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.

The experience of democracy is like the experience of life itself-always changing, infinite in its variety, sometimes turbulent and all the more valuable for having been tested by adversity.

Ironically, the very fact that democracy has such a lengthy history has actually contributed to confusion and disagreement, for 'democracy' has meant different things to different people at different times and places.

We should never take democracy for granted. Democracy can emerge and develop, but it can also decay.

Our democracy is not a product but a continual process. It is preserved not by monuments but deeds. Sometimes it needs refining; sometimes it needs amending; sometimes it needs defending. Always, it needs improving.

Democracy forever teases us with the contrast between its ideals and its realities, between its heroic possibilities and its sorry achievements.

Of course democracy is good, but it is a process, not a prescription.

The nature of a democracy consists to an important degree in the right of the people to criticize problems and mistakes.

Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

Democracy is an extraordinary adventure. It's difficult, full of daring and risk and danger. But it's the greatest gift we have.