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About This Quiz
And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your quiz can do you for you - ask what you can do for this quiz! The easy answer would be to take it! While it's hard to remember some president's names, others are recognized for their actions and their words! The Presidents of the United States have said some of the most well-known quotes to man. Can you pair the quote with its president?
America has a long, long history, but the beginning of the Presidents begins with George Washington in 1789. After the American Revolutionary War, the United States was essentially comprised of 13 singular states who governed mostly on their own under the Articles of Confederation. The late 1780s would bring about the Constitutional Convention and the unanimous election of George Washington.
While we're on our 45th president, there have only been 43 people to serve in office due to Grover Cleveland's nonconsecutive terms. From these 43 men, can you identify them from their quotes? Barack Obama might be easy to remember, but what about Zachary Taylor? Can you remember which 19th century President was counting "four score and seven years ago?"
If you can, you're ready for this quiz! Don't be afraid! As the 32nd president said, "The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself!"
Are you ready? Let's go!
Which U. S. President said, “My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country”?
Martin Van Buren.
Donald Trump.
John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy was the 35th President of the United States. Sometimes nicknamed “JFK,” he was assassinated November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas.
James Monroe.
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Which U. S. President said, “There is a homely old adage which runs: ‘Speak softly and carry a big stick, you will go far”?
Dwight Eisenhower
General Ulysses Grant.
Gerald Ford.
Theodore Roosevelt.
Theodore Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States. He was a strong advocate for increasing the National Park System and 230 million acres of public lands were established during his presidency.
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Which U. S. President said, “You want a friend in Washington? Get a dog”?
John Quincy Adams.
Harry S. Truman.
Truman was the 33rd President of the United States. Upon his election, the Chicago Tribune prematurely predicted his defeat and ran the headline: “Dewey Defeats Truman.”
George Washington.
Grover Cleveland.
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Which U. S. President said, “You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time”?
Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States. His election was the spark that caused the South to secede from the Union.
George W. Bush.
Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Barack Obama.
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President Andrew Jackson said what?
“One man with courage makes a majority.”
Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States. Although Jackson is noted for developing the “spoils system” where friends were appointed to office, he was also the only U. S. President to pay off the national debt during his presidency. The other quotes were said by: (b) Reagan (c) Nixon and (d) George W. Bush.
“It’s true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure why take the chance.”
“There will be no whitewash in the White House.”
“My opponents misunderestimated me.”
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Which U. S. President said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”?
John Adams.
Lyndon B. Johnson.
Warren G. Harding.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (nicknamed FDR) was the 32nd President of the United States. He was the only President elected to four terms in office (he died at the beginning of his fourth).
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Which U. S. President said, “I can’t deny I’m a better ex-President than I was a President”?
Ronald Reagan.
Theodore Roosevelt.
Jimmy Carter.
Carter was the 39th President of the United States. His Presidency was filled with economic troubles and saw a 14-month standoff with hostages in Iran that ended when he left office.
Barack Obama.
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Which U. S. President said, “It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one”?
John F. Kennedy.
George Washington.
Washington was the first President of the United States. He was also the first general in history to win a revolutionary war and not seize control of the nation. Washington resigned his commission as Commander-in-Chief December 23, 1783. Congress ruled the country until the first Presidential election was held 1788-1789.
Willam Howard Taft.
William McKinley, Jr.
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Which U. S. President said, “No nation is fit to sit in judgment upon any other nation”?
Andrew Johnson.
Woodrow Wilson.
Wilson was the 28th President of the United States. His Presidency occurred during World War I, and he was known for the idea of the League of Nations (a United Nations precursor).
Benjamin Harrison.
Grover Cleveland.
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President Richard Nixon said what?
“It was involuntary. They sank my boat.”
“I guess it proves that in America anyone can be President.”
“A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits.”
Richard Nixon was the 37th President of the United States. Although his presidency is most famous for the Watergate scandal, he also ended the Vietnam War and arranged for the release of POWs, improved relations with China, and enforced desegregation of Southern schools. The other quotes were said by: (a) Kennedy (b) Ford and (d) Coolidge.
“No one ever listened himself out of a job.”
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Which U. S. President said, “Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt”?
Gerald Ford.
James Madison.
Herbert Hoover.
Herbert Hoover was the 31st President of the United States. He was President during the Great Depression and enacted a “hands-off” policy when it came to the economy.
General Ulysses S. Grant.
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Which U. S. President said, “I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency—even if I’m in a Cabinet meeting”?
Andrew Jackson.
Chester Arthur.
John Adams.
Ronald Reagan.
Ronald Reagan was the 40th President of the United States. He began his career as a sports commentator and then moved to acting before running for President.
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Which U. S. President said, “Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery"?
George H. W. Bush.
Calvin Coolidge.
Calvin Coolidge was the 30th President of the United States. He was the only United States President born on Independence Day (1872).
Herbert Hoover.
Lyndon B. Johnson.
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Which U. S. President said, “When angry, count to ten before you speak; if very angry, a hundred”?
Martin Van Buren,
Thomas Jefferson.
Jefferson was the 3rd President of the United States. As a founding father, he was most known for being the primary author of the Declaration of Independence, but his presidency was also marked by the Louisiana Purchase, which almost doubled the size of the United States.
John Tyler.
William McKinley, Jr.
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Which U. S. President said, “Washington, D. C., is twelve square miles bordered by reality?”
James Madison.
Barack Obama.
George Washington.
Andrew Johnson.
Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States. He is probably best known for buying Alaska from the Russians for the United States.
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President Zachary Taylor said what?
“Have you not learned that not stocks or bonds or stately houses or products of the mill or field are in our country? It is a spiritual thought that is in our minds.”
“God knows that I have endeavored to fulfill what I conceived to be an honest duty, but I have been mistaken. My motives have been misconstrued, and my feelings most grossly outraged.”
Taylor was elected as the 12th President of the United States. Chosen because of his lack of political background, the committee thought he would be easy to control, but he wasn’t. He died in office under mysterious circumstances and even a coroner’s exam could not put to rest the idea he was poisoned. The other quotes were said by: (a) Harrison (b) Lincoln and (d) Jackson.
“Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not themselves and, under a just God, can not long retain it.”
“Any man worth his salt will stick up for what he believes right, but it takes a slightly better man to acknowledge without reservation that he is in error.”
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Which U. S. President said, “Read my lips. No new taxes”?
George H. W. Bush.
Bush was the 41st President of the United States. The Berlin Wall that had divided Eastern and Western Europe since World War II was torn down during his presidency.
Milliard Fillmore
Donald Trump.
Thomas Jefferson.
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Which U. S. President said, “There is nothing more corrupting, nothing more destructive of the noblest and finest feelings of our nature, than the exercise of unlimited power”?
Grover Cleveland.
Warren G. Harding.
William Henry Harrison.
Harrison was the 9th President of the United States. He was the last President who was a British subject by birth. He died of pneumonia 31 days into his presidency.
James K. Polk.
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Which U. S. President said, “The truth will set you free but first it will make you miserable”?
William McKinley, Jr.
James A. Garfield.
Garfield was the 20th President of the United States. He was shot by a Washington lawyer who had been refused a consular post appointment and died from infection only 200 days after he was elected.
John Adams.
Theodore Roosevelt..
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President Grant said what?
“Do you realize the responsibility I carry? I’m the only person standing between Nixon and the White House.”
“An atheist is a guy who watches a Notre Dame-SMC football game and doesn’t care who wins.”
“I know only two tunes: One of them is Yankee Doodle, and the other isn’t.”
Grant was the 18th President of the United States and took office upon Lincoln’s assassination. He nearly missed being assassinated with Lincoln. The other quotes were said by: (a) Kennedy (b) Eisenhower and (d) Lincoln.
“If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?”
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Which U. S. President said, “Don’t write so that you can be understood; write so that you can’t be misunderstood”?
Andrew Jackson.
James Madison.
General Ulysses S. Grant.
William Howard Taft.
Taft was the 27th President of the United States and was the 10th Chief Justice of the United States (the only person to serve in both those positions). Unfortunately, he also has the distinction of supporting the 16th Amendment, which legalized income tax.
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Which U. S. President said, “A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both”?
Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States and a five-star general during World War II. He had an eventful presidency that included ending McCarthyism, signing the Civil Rights Act of 1957, and establishing the Interstate Highway System.
James Buchanan.
Grover Cleveland.
Barack Obama.
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Which U. S. President said, “Peace is a journey of a thousand miles, and it must be taken one step at a time”?
Rutherford B. Hayes.
John Adams.
Lyndon B. Johnson.
Johnson was the 36th President of the United States. Johnson was President during the Civil Rights Movement and pushed Congress to pass the Civil Rights Bill of 1964, fulfilling a promise to finish what Kennedy had started.
Woodrow Wilson.
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Which U. S. President said, “It is by a thorough knowledge of the whole subject that [people] are enabled to judge correctly of the past and to give a proper direction to the future”?
William McKinley, Jr.
James Monroe.
Monroe was the 5th President of the United States. He was the last President considered a “Founding Father.” Jefferson once said, “Monroe was so honest that if you turned his soul inside out there would not be a spot on it.”
Donald Trump.
Jimmy Carter.
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President Rutherford B. Hayes said what?
This is a government of the people by the people and for the people no longer. It is a government of corporation by corporation for corporation.”
Within 10 years of Hayes’ statement (1886), corporations were given the rights of “natural persons” by the Supreme Court and protected by the Bill of Rights. Although the 14th Amendment nominally gave ex-slaves the right to vote, they did not acquire its full protection until the 1950s and women were not written in it until after the 1920s. The other quotes were said by: (b) Kennedy (c) Bush and (d) Eisenhower.
“Let us resolve to be masters, not the victims, of our history, controlling our own destiny without giving way to blind suspicions and emotions.”
“I will never apologize for the United States of America. I don’t care what the facts are.”
“When you are in any contest, you should work as if there were—to the very last minute—a chance to lose it.”
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Which U. S. President said, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman”?
Grover Cleveland.
Gerald Ford.
Calvin Coolidge.
Bill J. Clinton.
Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States. He was the first President to set up an official White House website (whitehouse.gov), and had a generally eventful, if not controversial, presidency where many bills were passed including, NAFTA, Don’t Ask; Don’t Tell, increasing the death penalty (the Omnibus Crime Bill), and requiring background checks and waiting periods for purchasing guns.
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Which U. S. President said, “An honorable defeat is better than a dishonorable victory”?
Dwight Eisenhower.
William McKinley, Jr.
Millard Fillmore.
Millard Fillmore was the 13th President of the United States. Fillmore (a Whig) was the last President who was neither Republican nor Democrat. He was successful in his bid to get California admitted as a free (as opposed to slave) state.
James Madison.
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Which U. S. President said, “States like these and their terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world”?
Herbert Hoover.
George W. Bush.
Bush was the 43rd President of the United States and son of President George H. W. Bush. He was President during the 9/11 terrorist attacks where nearly 3,000 people died.
Franklin Roosevelt.
William Taft.
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Which U. S. President said, “I have not sought this enormous responsibility, but I will not shirk it”?
Gerald Ford.
Ford was the 38th President of the United States. He became vice-president under the 25th Amendment when Spiro Agnew resigned and then became president upon Nixon's resignation. As such, he was the first person to hold both positions without being elected to them.
John Adams.
Abraham Lincoln.
Donald Trump.
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Which U. S. President said, “Why can’t I just eat my waffle”?
John Tyler.
Benjamin Harrison.
Barack Obama.
Obama was the 44th President of the United States. During his presidency, he supported and signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (sometimes referred to as “Obamacare”), which was fought in the Supreme Court and declared legal as a tax bill.
William Taft.
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President William McKinley Jr., said what?
“The best minds are not in government. If they were, business would hire them away.”
“The mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation.”
William McKinley was the 25th President of the United States. He was reluctant to enter into the Spanish-American War over Cuba’s independence, but the American people were sympathetic to the Cuban cause. The other quotes were said by: (a) Reagan (c) Fillmore and (d) Theodore Roosevelt.
“God knows I detest slavery, but it is an existing evil for which we are not responsible, and we must endure it until we can get rid of it without destroying the last hope of free government in the world.”
“It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort.”
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Which U. S. President said, “Some day, I will be remembered”?
George Washington.
Abraham Lincoln.
John F. Kennedy.
Grover Cleveland.
Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th President of the United States. He stalled the annexation of Hawaii and attempted to restore power to Queen Liliuokalani. Hawaii was not annexed until 1898 under McKinley.
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Which U. S. President said, “It’s always good to be underestimated”?
Thomas Jefferson.
Donald Trump.
The current (45th) President of the United States is President Donald Trump. Most agree that President Trump’s campaign was filled with controversy, including some he stirred up himself. Continuing his pattern of being first to the fight, he filed to run for reelection in 2020 the same day he was inaugurated as President in 2017.
John Quincy Adams.
Woodrow Wilson.
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Which U. S. President said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other”?
John Adams.
Adams was the 2nd President of the United States. He was the first President to move into the White House.
Franklin Pierce.
Martin Van Buren.
James Polk.
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President James Madison said what?
“Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in.”
“It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favors.”
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
Madison was the 4th President of the United States. He was the only president to lead troops in battle while president, and his wife, Dolly, saved many important things from the White House before the British burned it while he was away fighting. The other quotes were said by: (a) Jackson (b) Washington and (d) Lincoln.
“I don’t like that man. I must get to know him better.”
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