“Regimes planted by bayonets do not take root... Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the struggle that's now going on in the world will not be bombs and rockets but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the ideals to which we are dedicated.”

“I have left orders to be awakened at any time during national emergency, even if I'm in a cabinet meeting.”

“If more government is the answer, then it was a really stupid question.”

“I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always eventually triumph. And there's purpose and worth to each and every life.”

“I hope when you are my age, you’ll be able to say - as I have been able to say: We lived in freedom. Our lives were a statement, not an apology.” 

“My parents constantly drummed into me the importance of judging people as individuals. There was no more grievous sin at our household than a racial slur or other evidence of religious or racial intolerance. A lot of it, I think, was because my dad had learned what discrimination was like firsthand. He’d grown up in an era when some stores still had signs at their door saying, NO DOGS OR IRISHMEN ALLOWED. When my brother and I were growing up, there were still ugly tumors of racial bigotry in much of America, including the corner of Illinois where we lived. At our one local movie theater, blacks and whites had to sit apart—the blacks in the balcony. My mother and father urged my brother and me to bring home our black playmates, to consider them equals, and to respect the religious views of our friends, whatever they were. My brother’s best friend was black, and when they went to the movies, Neil sat with him in the balcony. My mother always taught us: “Treat thy neighbor as you would want your neighbor to treat you,” and “Judge everyone by how they act, not what they are.” Once my father checked into a hotel during a shoe-selling trip and a clerk told him: “You’ll like it here, Mr. Reagan, we don’t permit a Jew in the place.” My father, who told us the story later, said he looked at the clerk angrily and picked up his suitcase and left. “I’m a Catholic,” he said. “If it’s come to the point where you won’t take Jews, then some day you won’t take me either.” Because it was the only hotel in town, he spent the night in his car during a winter blizzard and I think it may have led to his first heart attack.”

“governments don't produce economic growth people do.”

“Mr. President: We, women political prisoners of the Soviet Union, congratulate you on your reelection to the spot of President of the USA. We look with hope to your country which is on the road of FREEDOM and respect for HUMAN RIGHTS. We wish you success on this road.”

“Here’s my strategy on the Cold War: We win, they lose.”

“Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.”

“Since I came to the White House, I've gotten two hearing aids, had a colon operation, a prostate operation, skin cancer, and I've been shot...damn thing is, I've never felt better.”

“On the streets of Moscow, looking into thousands of faces, I was reminded once again that it’s not people who make war, but governments—and people deserve governments that fight for peace in the nuclear age.”

“We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we will always be free.”

“Each generation goes further than the generation preceding it because it stands on the shoulders of that generation. You will have opportunities beyond anything we've ever known.”

“Of all the millions of refugees we’ve seen in the modern world, their flight is always away from, not toward, the Communist world.”