Internet users are rightly skeptical of any piece of media featuring an image of a person and a quote, as this category of content more often than not contains fabricated or misattributed messages. Every once in awhile, however, the internet gets it right, as was the case for this meme featuring an image of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and a quote concerning the objective of political parties:
If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.
This statement was taken from a speech President Eisenhower delivered at the Fourth Annual Republican Women's National Conference on 6 March 1956.
Below we've reproduced the relevant portion of this speech, which can be read in its entirety on the University of California Santa Barbara's web site for the American Presidency Project:
It is always, for me, a special privilege to address the women of this Party. First of all, for a very practical reason, they tell me there are more women in the United States than there are men. But secondly, I have the most deep conviction that a political party can be called such only if its whole purposes are soundly based in some moral and spiritual values.
The women of this nation are more concerned in their day by day work, I think, than are men with these values. They have the job of rearing our young, those youngsters who are so dear to all our hearts, and they want them to grow up with the right kind of values embedded in them so that as they meet the problems of life they will always have a certain kind of principle, or doctrine, or belief to fall back on that will help guide them through the rough spots.
I think the women, therefore, must be concerned with these values, and I return to my statement that if a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.