Person
president of the United States from 1877 to 1881 (1822-1893)
No public IJR answers mention Rutherford B. Hayes yet. As people ask about it and share their answers, they'll appear here.
“The melancholy thing in our public life is the insane desire to get higher.”
“For honest merit to succeed amid the tricks and intrigues which are now so lamentably common, I know is difficult; but the honor of success is increased by the obstacles which are to be surmounted. Let me triumph as a man or not at all.”
“I have a talent for silence and brevity. I can keep silent when it seems best to do so, and when I speak I can, and do usually, quit when I am done. This talent, or these two talents, I have cultivated. Silence and concise, brief speaking have got me some laurels, and, I suspect, lost me some. No odds. Do what is natural to you, and you are sure to get all the recognition you are entitled to.”
“We can travel longer, night and day, without losing our spirits than almost any persons we ever met.”
“Unjust attacks on public men do them more good than unmerited praise. They are hurt less by undeserved censure than by undeserved commendation. Abuse helps; often praise hurts.”
“All appointments hurt. Five friends are made cold or hostile for every appointment; no new friends are made. All patronage is perilous to men of real ability or merit. It aids only those who lack other claims to public support.”
Quotes via Wikiquote (CC BY-SA), each with its original source.