Quotes on Majority Rule

When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong.

Democracies have been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their death.

The justification of majority rule in politics is not to be found in its ethical superiority.

The right to vote is a consequence, not a primary cause, of a free social system - and its value depends on the constitutional structure implementing and strictly delimiting the voters' power; unlimited majority rule is an instance of the principle of tyranny.

But government in which the majority rule in all cases can not be based on justice, even as far as men understand it.

The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.

Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.

...but before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself.

All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.