# Quote — John Kenneth Galbraith, The Great Crash 1929

> Our political tradition sets great store by the generalized symbol of evil. This is the wrongdoer whose wrongdoing will be taken by the public to be the secret propensity of a whole community or class.

- Author: [John Kenneth Galbraith](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith.md)
- Book: [The Great Crash 1929](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith/the-great-crash-1929.md)
- Page: 154
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Kenneth_Galbraith#The_Great_Crash,_1929_(1954_and_1997)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith/the-great-crash-1929/our-political-tradition

## More from this book

> But now, as throughout history, financial capacity and political perspicacity are inversely correlated. Long run salvation by men of business has never been highly regarded if it means disturbance of orderly life and convenience in the present. So inaction will be advocated in the present even though it means deep trouble in the future. Here, at least equally with communism, lies the threat to capitalism. It is what causes men who know that things are going quite wrong to say that things are fundamentally sound.

p. 194 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith/the-great-crash-1929/but-now-as-throughout.md)

> But there is still a considerable difference between a failure to do enough that is right and a determination to do much that is wrong.

p. 192 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith/the-great-crash-1929/but-there-is-still.md)

> In accordance with an old but not outworn tradition, it might now be wise for all to conclude that crime, or even misbehavior, is the act of an individual, not the predisposition of a class.

p. 165 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-kenneth-galbraith/the-great-crash-1929/in-accordance-with.md)