“If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.[Inaugural Address, January 20 1961]”

“To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is required - not because the Communists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.”

“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.[Inaugural Address, January 20 1961]”

“If we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.[Commencement Address at American University, June 10 1963]”

“Now the trumpet summons us again—not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are—but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation"—a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.Inaugural Adress, January 20, 1961”

“Above all, we are coming to understand that the arts incarnate the creativity of a free people. When the creative impulse cannot flourish, when it cannot freely select its methods and objects, when it is deprived of spontaneity, then society severs the root of art.”

“Mankind must put an end to war - or war will put an end to mankind.[Address before the United Nations, September 25 1961]”