John Fitzgerald Kennedy quotes

“Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Mankind must put an end to war before war puts an end to mankind.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility - I welcome it.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch - we are going back from whence we came.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“A child miseducated is a child lost.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“A nation which has forgotten the quality of courage which in the past has been brought to public life is not as likely to insist upon or regard that quality in its chosen leaders today - and in fact we have forgotten.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“The greater our knowledge increases the more our ignorance unfolds.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“The path we have chosen for the present is full of hazards, as all paths are. The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Our progress as a nation can be no swifter than our progress in education. The human mind is our fundamental resource.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Our problems are man-made, therefore they may be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for President, who happens also to be a Catholic.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“There is always inequality in life. Some men are killed in a war and some men are wounded and some men never leave the country. Life is unfair.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans - born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Politics is like football; if you see daylight, go through the hole.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“To state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past. The prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“We stand today on the edge of a new frontier - the frontier of the 1960's - a frontier of unknown opportunities and perils - a frontier of unfulfilled hopes and threats.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“If we cannot now end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“I'm always rather nervous about how you talk about women who are active in politics, whether they want to be talked about as women or as politicians.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“I look forward to a great future for America - a future in which our country will match its military strength with our moral restraint, its wealth with our wisdom, its power with our purpose.”

— John Fitzgerald Kennedy