Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely

1. An observation that a person's sense of morality lessens as his or her power increases. The statement was made by Lord Acton, a British historian of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Example Sentences

The conservative Nationalist Republican Alliance said the effort to maintain and concentrate power “is the precursor to a dictatorship. Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

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The British historian Lord Acton famously put it like this: “Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

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Because this case arose from allegations of corruption, it calls to mind Lord Acton’s famous warning that “all power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

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