Quotes by First Ladies

I think at a child's birth if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift that gift should be curiosity.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Every woman dreams of her own political career and her own place in life.
Raisa M. Gorbachev
You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with the best you have to give.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You don't just luck into things. ... You build step by step whether it's friendships or opportunities.
Barbara Bush
Youth is after all just a moment but it is the moment the spark that you always carry in your heart.
Raisa M. Gorbachev
The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Become so wrapped up in something that you forget to be afraid.
Lady Bird Johnson
You gain strength courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.... You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
Eleanor Roosevelt
I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do provided he keeps doing them until he gets a record of successful experiences behind him.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Believe in something larger than yourself.
Barbara Bush
In the long run we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.
Eleanor Roosevelt
It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.
Eleanor Roosevelt
I am convinced the longer I live that life and its blessings are not so entirely unjustly distributed as when we are suffering greatly we are inclined to suppose.
Mary Todd Lincoln
It's odd that you can get so anesthetized by your own pain or your own problem that you don't quite fully share the hell of someone close to you.
Lady Bird Johnson
Some people give time some money some their skills and connections some literally give their life's blood . . . but everyone has something to give.
Barbara Bush
Somehow we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Minimum information given with maximum politeness.
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
I listen and give input only if somebody asks.
Barbara Bush
I'm glad I never feel important it does complicate life.
Eleanor Roosevelt
More people are ruined by victory I imagine than by defeat.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Friendship with oneself is all-important because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No man is defeated without until he has first been defeated within.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt
I think somehow we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Criticism ... makes very little dent upon me unless I think there is some real justification and something should be done.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Remember always that you have not only the right to be an individual you have an obligation to be one.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You can't move so fast that you try to change [a situation] faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No one from the beginning of time has had security.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them.
Lady Bird Johnson
Any committee is only as good as the most knowledgeable determined and vigorous person on it. There must be somebody who provides the flame.
Lady Bird Johnson
The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not our circumstances.
Martha Washington
This I know. This I believe with all my heart. If we want a free and peaceful world if we want to make the deserts bloom and man grow to greater dignity as a human being-we can do it!
Eleanor Roosevelt
It isn't enough to talk about peace one must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it one must work at it.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You always admire what you really don't understand.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You don't just luck into things ... you build step by step whether it's friendships or opportunities.
Barbara Bush
When you get to the end of your rope tie a knot in it and hang on.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No leader can be too far ahead of his followers.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Criticism ... makes very little dent upon me unless I think there is some real justification and something should be done.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Remember always that you have not only the right to be an individual you have an obligation to be one.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Somehow we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You can't move so fast that you try to change [a situation] faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No one from the beginning of time has had security.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them.
Lady Bird Johnson
Any committee is only as good as the most knowledgeable determined and vigorous person on it. There must be somebody who provides the flame.
Lady Bird Johnson
The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not our circumstances.
Martha Washington
This I know. This I believe with all my heart. If we want a free and peaceful world if we want to make the deserts bloom and man grow to greater dignity as a human being-we can do it!
Eleanor Roosevelt
It isn't enough to talk about peace one must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it one must work at it.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You always admire what you really don't understand.
Eleanor Roosevelt
You don't just luck into things ... you build step by step whether it's friendships or opportunities.
Barbara Bush
When you get to the end of your rope tie a knot in it and hang on.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No leader can be too far ahead of his followers.
Eleanor Roosevelt
No leader can be too far ahead of his followers.
Eleanor Roosevelt
A woman is like a tea bag - only in hot water do you realize how strong she is.
Nancy Reagan
You don't just luck into things.... You build step by step whether it's friendships or opportunities.
Barbara Bush
Without fanaticism we cannot accomplish anything.
Eva Peron
The trouble is that not enough people have come together with the firm determination to live the things which they say they believe.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Clouds and darkness surround us yet heaven is just and the day of triumph will surely come when justice and truth will be vindicated. Our wrongs will be made right and we will once more taste the blessings of freedom.
Mary Todd Lincoln
When you cease to make a contribution you begin to die.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Almsgiving leaves a man just where he was before. Aid restores him to society as an individual worthy of all respect and not as a man with a grievance.
Eva Peron
I'm not a competitive person and I think women like me because they don't think I'm competitive just nice.
Barbara Bush