{"author":"Jon Meacham","author_id":"Jon+Meacham","total_quotes":24,"quotes":[{"text":"Jefferson was the rare leader who stood out from the crowd without intimidating it.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["charisma","leadership","meekness","unity"],"id":16130,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"I believe history will come to view 9/11 as an event on par with November 22, 1963, the date on which John F. Kennedy was murdered, cutting short a presidency that was growing ever more promising. Dreams died that day in Dallas; it is easy to imagine the 1960s turning out rather differently had President Kennedy lived.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["history","day","short "],"id":30232,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"In the closed circle of the war cabinet, pounded by terrible report after terrible report, there had been uncertainty about whether he could fend off the drift to exploring a deal with Hitler. The determination of the larger group trumped the tentativeness of the smaller, and Churchill fulfilled his role as leader by disentangling himself from defeatism--one of his singular achievements at the end of May 1940.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["defeatism","determination","group-dynamics","winston-churchill"],"id":42737,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"No government can be maintained without the principle of fear as well as duty.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["ity","enforcement","government","reverence"],"id":60407,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"He turned the presidency – and the President's House – into something it had not been before: a center of curiosity and inquiry, of vibrant institution that played informal but important roles in the broader life of the nation, from science to literature.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["curiosity","inquiry","leadership","liberal-arts"],"id":95779,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"The traditional religious right's failure to restore public-school prayer or pass an antiabortion constitutional amendment has likely helped fuel the spread of the more extreme dominionist school.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["school","prayer","fuel "],"id":124165,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"Democracy is easy; republicanism is hard. Democracy is fueled by passion; republicanism is founded on moderation. Democracy is loud, raucous, disorderly; republicanism is quiet, cool, judicious – and that we still live in its light is the Founders' most wondrous deed.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["democracy","founders","republicanism"],"id":135545,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"He was the most contradictory of men. A champion of extending freedom and democracy to even the poorest of whites, Jackson was an unrepentant slaveholder. A sentimental man who rescued an Indian orphan on a battlefield to raise in his home, Jackson was responsible for the removal of Indian tribes from their ancestral lands. An enemy of Eastern financial elites and a relentless opponent of the Bank of the United States, which he believed to be a bastion of corruption, Jackson also promised to die, if necessary, to preserve the power and prestige of the central government. Like us and our America, Jackson and his America achieved great things while committing grievous sins.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["andrew-jackson","history"],"id":136192,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"As much as Jefferson loved France residence abroad gave him greater appreciation for his own nation. He was a tireless advocate for things American while abroad, and a promoter of things European while at home. Moving between two worlds, translating the best of the old into the new and explaining the benefits of the new to the old, he created a role for himself as both intermediary and arbiter.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["appreciation","difference","gratitude"],"id":138842,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"},{"text":"Steadiness of faith, was, in the long run, as illuminating and essential as sophistication of thought.","author":"Jon Meacham","tags":["inspirational","political"],"id":181584,"author_id":"Jon+Meacham"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":24,"pages":3,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}