Dean Acheson Quotes (1893-1971)

“The test for aid to poor nations is therefore whether it makes them capable of being productive. If it fails to do so, it is likely to make them even poorer in the – not so very – long run.”

“The paramount purposes of the pact are peace and security... It is clear that the North Atlantic Pact is not an improvisation. It is the statement of the facts and lessons from two world wars in less than half a century. That experience has taught us that the control of Europe by a single aggressive, unfriendly Power would constitute an intolerable threat to the national security of the United States... We must make it clear that armed attack will be met by collective defence, prompt and effective. That is the meaning of the North Atlantic Pact.”

“In a time of moral and intellectual anarchy, he handed on the great tradition of faith in the mind and spirit of man.”

“So important to all of us, that if he did not exist — as Voltaire said of God — he would have to be invented. ... One of the most difficult men with whom I have ever had to deal.”

“I hate to say this because I know it's going to be misunderstood, but his reputation is greater because of the tragedy of his death than it would have been if he had lived out two terms. ... He was a most attractive person. He had real charm. He did not seem to be in any sense a great man. I do not think he knew a great deal about the matters which it's desirable that a chief of state or a President of the United States should know about. He was not decisive.”

“Wake up, America. Your liberties are being stolen before your very eyes. What Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln fought for, Truman, Acheson, and McGrath are striving desperately to nullify. Wake up, Americans, and dare to think and say and do. Dare to cry: No More War!”

“As you know, very recently the secretary of state proclaimed his loyalty to a man guilty of what has always been considered as the most abominable of all crimes — of being a traitor to the people who gave him a position of great trust. The secretary of state, in attempting to justify his continued devotion to the man who sold out the Christian world to the atheistic world, referred to Christ's Sermon on the Mount as a justification and reason therefore, and the reaction of the American people to this would have made the heart of Abraham Lincoln happy. When this pompous diplomat in striped pants, with a phony British accent, proclaimed to the American people that Christ on the Mount endorsed communism, high treason, and betrayal of a sacred trust, the blasphemy was so great that it awakened the dormant indignation of the American people. He has lighted the spark which is resulting in a moral uprising and will end only when the whole sorry mess of twisted warped thinkers are swept from the national ugly so ugly that we may have a new birth of national honesty and decency in government.”