Pierre Trudeau Quotes

There is no such thing as a model or ideal Canadian. What could be more absurd than the concept of an "all Canadian" boy or girl? A society which emphasizes uniformity is one which creates intolerance and hate.

The past is to be respected and acknowledged, but not to be worshipped. It is our future in which we will find our greatness.

Americans should never underestimate the constant pressure on Canada which the mere presence of the United States has produced. We're different people from you and we're different people because of you. Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even-tempered is the beast, if I can call it that, one is effected by every twitch and grunt. It should not therefore be expected that this kind of nation, this Canada, should project itself as a mirror image of the United States.

A country, after all, is not something you build as the pharaohs built the pyramids, and then leave standing there to defy eternity. A country is something that is built every day out of certain basic shared values.

If Canada is to survive, it can only survive in mutual respect and in love for one another.

Our hopes are high. Our faith in the people is great. Our courage is strong. And our dreams for this beautiful country will never die.

The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation.

If you live in a society where those who govern society and determine its path do not respect freedom of speech and freedom of religion, freedom of choice, freedom of assembly, and if there is no democratic process and no way to change the order of things by reason and peace and love and so on, and if, as a result of that, certain ideas in which you believe are being crushed, then I think the only way you can defend yourself against this violence is in using violence of your own.

You just cannot cut a country in two any more than you can cut a human being in two. If you do, you do not have two human beings; you have a corpse.

We must now establish the basic principles, the basic values and beliefs which hold us together as Canadians so that beyond our regional loyalties there is a way of life and a system of values which make us proud of the country that has given us such freedom and such immeasurable joy.

What sets a canoeing expedition apart is that it purifies you more rapidly and inescapably than any other. Travel a thousand miles by train and you are a brute; pedal five hundred on a bicycle and you remain basically a bourgeois; paddle a hundred in a canoe and you are already a child of nature.

Bilingualism is not an imposition on the citizens. The citizens can go on speaking one language or six languages, or no languages if they so choose. Bilingualism is an imposition on the state and not the citizens.

I've been called worse things by better people.

Le raison avant la passion - Reason over passion.

I believe that Canada cannot, indeed, that Canada must not survive by force. The country will only remain united - it should only remain united - if its citizens want to live together in one civil society.

I bear solemn witness to the fact that NATO heads of state and of government meet only to go through the tedious motions of reading speeches, drafted by others, with the principal objective of not rocking the boat.

Let us overthrow the totems, break the taboos. Or better, let us consider them cancelled. Coldly, let us be intelligent.

I will use all my strength to bring about a just society to a nation living in a tough world.

Well, I am trying to put Quebec in its place - and the place of Quebec is in Canada, nowhere else.

Liberalism is the philosophy for our time, because it does not try to conserve every tradition of the past, because it does not apply to new problems the old doctrinaire solutions, because it is prepared to experiment and innovate and because it knows that the past is less important than the future.

Canada is a country whose main exports are hockey players and cold fronts. Our main imports are baseball players and acid rain.

I remember thinking that walking on the beach as a free man is pretty desirable.

Obviously I prefer freedom, but I know, and I think all history has told us, that freedom cannot flow from anarchy and disorder.

Luck, that's when preparation and opportunity meet.

The new frontier lies not beyond the planets but within each one of us.

There are a lot of bleeding hearts around who just dont like to see people with helmets and guns. All I can say is go and bleed It is more important to keep law and order in society than to be worried about weak-kneed people Society must take every means at its disposal to defend itself against the emergence of a parallel power which defies the elected power.

Canada will be a strong country when Canadians of all provinces feel at home in all parts of the country, and when they feel that all Canada belongs to them.

I recognize that in some cases it's more important to have freedom and justice than to have peace.

I think we have to realize that Canada is not immortal; but, if it is going to go, let it go with a bang rather than a whimper.

When they are 50 yards from Parliament Hill, they are no longer honourable members, they are just nobodies.

My life is one long curve, full of turning points.

I just think you Westerners should take over this country if you are so smart.

I was inclined to judge the validity of a man's faith more by the depth of his roots in reality and brotherhood and love. So I felt more at home, shall we say with some Zoroastrians in the Far East, than I did with some Catholic missionaries.

Paddling a canoe is a source of enrichment and inner renewal.

I walked until midnight in the storm, then I went home and took a sauna for an hour and a half. It was all clear. I listened to my heart and saw if there were any signs of my destiny in the sky, and there were none - there were just snowflakes.

I don't see any easy way of disqualifying people on the basis that they decide not to work.

In reality, though, the first thing to ask of history is that it should point out to us the paths of liberty. The great lesson to draw from revolutions is not that they devour humanity but rather that tyranny never fails to generate them.

I believe a constitution can permit the co-existence of several cultures and ethnic groups with a single state.

Canadians should realise when they are well off under the Monarchy. For the vast majority of Canadians, being a Monarchy is probably the only form of government acceptable to them. I have always been for parliamentary democracy and I think the institution of Monarchy with the Queen heading it all has served Canada well.

What is wonderful about a university like LSE is that you not only receive teaching of very high quality, you also learn where to find the knowledge you are seeking. And you make unexpected discoveries; it was a Marxist professor who introduced me to the work of Cardinal Newman, a great master of English prose as well as theology.

I want to separate sin from crime. You may have to ask forgiveness for your sins from God, but not from the Minister of Justice. There's no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation.

lf there is anything that puzzles me in this game lt is that the longer that you are in the job of Prime Minister, the harder you have to work to do your job. With anything else, such as stenography, administering a store, or whatever done it for nine or ten years you get to know the ropes pretty well and it becomes easy and you can spend a lot of time playing golf or something. l feel that the more you know, the more you have to know and the more problems come.

Society is responsible for its social organization, and if it can't provide the wherewithal for men to be gainfully employed then it should pay the penalty and give them welfare.

We are in the extreme centre, the radical middle. That is our position.

We don't think every man should be free to pass on everything to his descendants.

I never actually got around to taping conversations with my guests, but there are a lot of things you can learn from a man like Nixon.

If I found in my own ranks that a certain number of guys wanted to cut my throat, I'd make sure that I cut their throats first.

The die is cast in Canada: there are two ethnic and linguistic groups; each is too strong and too deeply rooted in the past, too firmly bound to a mother culture, to be able to swamp the other. But if the two will collaborate inside of a truly pluralist state, Canada could become a privileged place where the federalist form of government, which is the government of tomorrow's world, will be perfected.

Freedom can flow from order. That is not to say that freedom always flows from order because you can have a totalitarian order and you can have an undemocratic order from which freedom will not flow, but that surest way to destroy freedom is to have chaos.

I'm sure in a few years it will be unthinkable to say there were 20 years when we didn't recognize the People's Republic of China. And then we'll have to explain what the political constraints were and why it didn't happen earlier.