Jon Meacham

“Our greatest leaders are neither dreamers nor dictators: They are, like Jefferson, those who articulate national aspirations yet master the mechanics of influence and know when to depart from dogma.”

“He dreamed big but understood that dreams become reality only when their champions are strong enough and wily enough to bend history to their purposes.”

“Steadiness of faith, was, in the long run, as illuminating and essential as sophistication of thought.”

“The service--a moved Roosevelt called it the "keynote" of his meeting with Churchill--was working a kind of magic, which is one of the points of liturgy and theater: to use the dramatic to convince people of a reality they cannot see.”

“In the closed circle of the war cabinet, pounded by terrible report after terrible report, there had been uncertainty about whether he could fend off the drift to exploring a deal with Hitler. The determination of the larger group trumped the tentativeness of the smaller, and Churchill fulfilled his role as leader by disentangling himself from defeatism--one of his singular achievements at the end of May 1940.”

“Or, as Jackson would have said: The people, sir-the people will set things right.”

“Jackson was a transformative president in part because he had a transcendent personality; other presidents who followed him were not transformative, and served unremarkably.”

“Always take all the time to reflect that circumstances permit, but when the time for action has come, stop thinking. (Andrew Jackson)”

“With a writer's eye, Irving detected Jackson's depths. "As his admirers say, he is truly an old Roman-to which I would add, with a little dash of the Greek; for I suspect he is as knowing as I believe he is honest.”

“In rich and captivating prose, Jessica DuLong kindly invites the rest of us on the journey of her lifetime: from a dot-com job to the fabled waters of the Hudson River, where she became a fireboat engineer. This is an unusual and fascinating book.”

“We live in a center-right country. Now watch me smile oleaginously.”