The price of empire is America's soul, and that price is too high.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that the pursuit of power and empire compromises core values and ethics.
J. William Fulbright's quote reflects on the moral cost associated with the pursuit of empire by the United States. It warns that the quest for power and influence can lead to significant sacrifices, including the loss of essential values and ethics, implying that such a cost is unjustifiable for any nation that aspires to uphold its soul and integrity.
In practice
During a discussion about foreign policy, one might refer to Fulbright's quote to emphasize the importance of ethical considerations.
International educational exchange is the most significant current project designed to continue the process of humanizing mankind to the point, we would hope, that men can learn to live in peace-eventually even to cooperate in constructive activities rather than compete in a mindless contest of mutual destruction....We must try to expand the boundaries of human wisdom, empathy and perception, and there is no way of doing that except through education.
Maturity requires a final accommodation between our aspirations and our limitations.
Finally, the Program aims, through these means, to bring a little more knowledge, a little more reason, and a little more compassion into world affairs and thereby to increase the chance that nations will learn at last to live in peace and friendship.
In a democracy, dissent is an act of faith.
We have the power to do any damn fool thing we want to do, and we seem to do it about every ten minutes.
The biggest lesson I learned from Vietnam is not to trust [our own] government statements.
Watch your thoughts as you watch the street traffic. People come and go; you register without response. It may not be easy in the beginning, but with some practice you will find that your mind can function on many levels at the same time and you can be aware of them all.
It was childish to feel disappointed, but childishness comes almost as naturally to a man as to a child.
In the world I am_x000D_ Always a stranger_x000D_ I do not understand its language_x000D_ It does not understand my silence
There is little less trouble in governing a private family than a whole kingdom.
In God there is no duality. In that Presence "I" and "we" and "you" do not exist. "I" and "you" and "we" and "He" become one.... Since in the Unity there is no distinction, the Quest and the Way and the Seeker become one.
The president is the high priest of what sociologist Robert Bellah calls the 'American civil religion.' The president must invoke the name of God (though not Jesus), glorify America's heroes and history,quote its sacred texts (the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution), and perform the transubstantiation of pluribus unum.
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