Congress Quotes - page 52
Still the Constitution tells us emphatically that the power of the purse belongs to Congress. It is hoped, Mr. President, distinguished colleagues, that with these proposed amendments in the Fiscal Year 2015 budget or GAA, Congress will adhere to the ruling of the highest Court in the land and regain its Constitutionally-mandated control over the purse strings.
Francis Escudero
It requires pragmatic problem-solving from even the most passionate partisans. It relies on compromise between opposing sides to protect the interests we share. We can fight like hell for our ideas to prevail. But we have to respect each other or at least respect the fact that we need each other. That has never been truer than today, when Congress must govern with a president who has no experience of public office, is often poorly informed and can be impulsive in his speech and conduct. We must respect his authority and constitutional responsibilities. We must, where we can, cooperate with him. But we are not his subordinates. We don't answer to him. We answer to the American people. We must be diligent in discharging our responsibility to serve as a check on his power. And we should value our identity as members of Congress more than our partisan affiliation.
John McCain
I welcome Senator McCain's important statement on President Reagan's legacy and the need to move toward a world free of nuclear weapons. In my speech in Prague, I outlined my agenda for keeping the American people safe from the dangers posed by nuclear weapons, and I am grateful to John McCain for his leadership on these critical issues. I have outlined an ambitious strategy for promoting arms control and preventing nuclear terrorism and proliferation, which is already bearing fruit. I look forward to working with Senator McCain and the entire Congress to ensure that we accomplish these goals together for the American people and the security of the entire planet.
John McCain
In two sentences, McCain is betting that people believe Clinton is going to win in November. And that many voters in Arizona who don't like Trump aren't keen on Clinton either. (A recent national Washington Post-ABC News poll found a record number of Americans dislike Clinton, though she's still more popular than Trump.) McCain is pulling from a playbook Republicans used two decades ago to ditch the Republican presidential nominee. Before McCain, the highest-profile Republican to deliver that message was House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, who sent a fundraising email in August that read, "If we fail to protect our majority in Congress, we could be handing President Hillary Clinton a blank check." It looked to The Post's Jenna Johnson and Karen Tumulty that Ryan might have predicted Clinton would win in a landslide (because only a historic Clinton landslide would be enough to put the GOP House majority in peril).
John McCain
And then there was his complicated relationship with our state. John McCain lived in many places after Vietnam, but for the last 36 years he called Arizona home, and represented the state in Congress - from 1982 to 1986 as a representative, and then from ‘86 to his death as a member of the United States Senate. McCain embraced Arizona, adopting the pretty landscape of central Phoenix and Cornville, posting photos of red-rock hikes, but doing very little during his tenure to support the state. In fact, his stand against "pork-barrel politics” at a time when his colleagues in Congress were busy lining their own states' pockets with infrastructure cost Arizona dearly while increasing McCain's popularity as a refreshingly honest leader who turned down handouts. In a lot of ways, it didn't matter what state he lived in. John McCain was America's senator, not Arizona's, a transplant (or a carpetbagger - again, it depends on your perspective) who adopted the state as his own.
John McCain
In trying to analyse the various elements in the Congress, the dominating position of Gandhiji must always be remembered. He dominates to some extent the Congress, but far more so he dominates the masses. He does not easily fall in any group and is much bigger than the so-called Gandhian group. That is one of the basic factors of the situation. The conscious and thinking Leftists in the country recognise it and, whatever their ideological or temperamental differences with him, have tried to avoid anything approaching a split. Their attempt bas been to leave the Congress under its present leadership, which means under Gandhiji's guidance, and at the same time to push it as far as they could more to the left to radicalise it, and to spread own ideology."
Jawaharlal Nehru
Many a Congressman was a communalist under his national cloak. But the Congress leadership stood firm and, on the whole, refused to side with either communal party, or rather with any communal group. Long ago, right at the commencement of non-co-operation or even earlier, Gandhiji had laid down his formula for solving the communal problem. According to him, it could only be solved by goodwill and the generosity of the majority group, and so he was prepared to agree to everything that the Muslims might demand. He wanted to win them over, not to bargain with them. With foresight and a true sense of values he grasped at the reality that was worthwhile; but others who thought they knew the market price of everything, and were ignorant of the true value of anything, stuck to the methods of the market-place. They saw the cost of purchase with painful clearness, but they had no appreciation of the worth of the article they might have bought.
Jawaharlal Nehru
[In a veiled attack on Congress and other rivals without taking their names, the Prime Minister said that for 30 years there was a drama going on for very long.] "There was such a tag which was in fashion wearing which all sins would get washed. That fake tag was called secularism. Slogans would be raised for the unity of secular people. But you would have witnessed that from 2014 - 2019 that whole bunch stopped speaking."... "In this election not even a single political party could dare to mislead the country by wearing the mask of secularism."
Narendra Modi
But to say a word in appreciation of governance reforms in Gujarat, or to credit Modi for having given Gujarat its first ever riot-free 12 years since independence, is to commit political hara-kiri – one is forever tainted with the colours of fascism. This intellectual terror created by the anti-Modi brigade pushed me to find out for myself the reason behind this obsessive anxiety about Modi. ... The demonisation of Modi did not start with the 2002 riots. "Smear Modi Campaign”started from day one and was carried out in the same do-or-die spirit that one witnesses today when Congress Party wants to eliminate him from the prime ministerial race.
Narendra Modi
Every year Congress and the president sign laws that make us do more things and gives us less money to do it with. I see people in my state, middle-class people - their taxes have gone up in Washington and their services have gone down while the wealthy have gotten tax cuts. I have seen what's happened in this last four years when - in my state, when people lose their jobs there's a good chance I'll know them by their names. When a factory closes, I know the people who ran it. When the businesses go bankrupt, I know them. And I've been out here for 13 months meeting in meetings just like this ever since October, with people like you all over America, people that have lost their jobs, lost their livelihood, lost their health insurance.
Bill Clinton
Today we faced an unprecedented assault on our Capitol, our Constitution, and our country.
The assault was fueled by more than four years of poison politics spreading deliberate misinformation, sowing distrust in our system, and pitting Americans against one another. The match was lit by Donald Trump and his most ardent enablers, including many in Congress, to overturn the results of an election he lost.
The election was free, the count was fair, the result is final. We must complete the peaceful transfer of power our Constitution mandates.
I have always believed that America is made up of good, decent people. I still do. If that's who we really are, we must reject today's violence, turn the page, and move forward together - honoring our Constitution, remaining committed to a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.
Bill Clinton
The Cubans who fought for our independence and at that very moment were giving their blood and their lives believed in good faith in the joint resolution of the Congress of the United States of April 20, 1898, which declared that "Cuba is, and by right ought to be, free and independent.”... But that illusion was followed by a rude awakening. After two years of military occupation of our country, the unexpected happened... a new law was passed by the United States Congress... stated that the constitution of the Cuba must have an appendix under which the United States would be granted the right to intervene in Cuba's political affairs and, furthermore, to lease certain parts of Cuba for naval bases or coal supply station.
Fidel Castro
The Constitution requires an adoption in toto, and for ever. It has been so adopted by the other States. An adoption for a limited time would be as defective as an adoption of some of the articles only. In short any condition whatever must viciate the ratification. What the New Congress by virtue of the power to admit new States, may be able & disposed to do in such case, I do not enquire as I suppose that is not the material point at present. I have not a moment to add more than my fervent wishes for your success & happiness.
James Madison
The Constitution of the United States recognizes the slaves, held within some of the States of the Union, only in their capacity of persons - persons held to labor or service in a State under the laws thereof - persons constituting elements of representation in the popular branch of the National Legislature - persons, the migration or importation of whom should not be prohibited by Congress prior to the year 1808. The Constitution no where recognizes them as property. The words slave and slavery are studiously excluded from the Constitution. Circumlocutions are the fig-leaves under which these parts of the body politic are decently concealed. Slaves, therefore, in the Constitution of the United States are recognized only as persons, enjoying rights and held to the performance of duties.
John Quincy Adams
Leahy had no part in the decision to relieve MacArthur, which came as a considerable shock to him, for he had known and liked the brilliant general for over fifty years, even though he had deplored his theatrical ways. He never questioned the president's authority and he felt he was not sufficiently informed to make a judgment on the question of MacArthur's relief. He wrote, somewhat mildly that the "detachment of MacArthur will stimulate aggressive political opposition by the Republican member of Congress."
Douglas MacArthur
The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Brigadier General (Corps of Engineers) Douglas MacArthur (ASN: 0-57), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving as Chief of Staff, 42d Division, A.E.F., in the Salient-du-Feys, France, 9 March 1918. When Company D, 168th Infantry, was under severe attack in the salient du Feys, France, General MacArthur voluntarily joined it, upon finding that he could do so without interfering with his normal duties, and by his coolness and conspicuous courage aided materially in its success.
Douglas MacArthur
We call this (Impeachment of Donald Trump) a trial, this isn't a trial by any stretch of the imagination. It's political farce... It shows utter contempt for the rule of law which any democracy must be based... If we're going to have hearings, why don't we have hearings on the politicians and generals who've fed us 18 years of feudal endless war... the greatest strategic blunder in American history... nine illegal wars - wars are supposed to be declared by Congress...the wholesale surveillance begun by the Bush administration, exposed by Edward Snowden, in direct violation of the Fourth Amendment.. the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which makes it a crime for the government to surveil any U.S. citizens; the global programming of extraordinary rendition, kidnapping and torture; [and] the decision by the Obama administration to reinterpret the 2002 Authorization to Use Military Force Act to give it the right to act as judge, jury and executioner and assassinate U.S. citizens.
Chris Hedges
I'm often asked why we're in Iraq when Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks. The answer is that the regime of Saddam Hussein was a clear threat. My administration, the Congress, and the United Nations saw the threat. And after 9/11, Saddam's regime posed a risk that the world could not afford to take. The world is safer because Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. And now the challenge is to help the Iraqi people build a democracy that fulfills the dreams of the nearly 12 million Iraqis who came out to vote in free elections last December.
Saddam Hussein
The impeachment process was never intended to become a weapon for a partisan majority in Congress to attack the President. To do so is a violation of the fundamental separation of powers doctrine at the heart of the Constitution. It is an invitation to future partisan majorities in future Congresses to use the impeachment power to undermine the President. It could weaken Republican and Democratic Presidents alike for years to come. This case is a constitutional travesty. We deplore the conduct of President Clinton that led to this yearlong distraction for the nation. But we should deplore even more the partisan attempt to abuse the Constitution by misusing the impeachment power.
Ted Kennedy
The question is not whether we will disarm Saddam Hussein of his weapons of mass destruction but how. And it is wrong for Congress to declare war against Iraq now, before we have exhausted the alternatives. It is wrong for the president to demand a declaration of war from Congress when he says he has not decided whether to go to war. It is wrong to avert our attention now from the greater and far more immediate threat of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda terrorism.
Ted Kennedy
At another Democratic convention, in arguing for this cause, I spoke of the insurance coverage senators and members of Congress provide for themselves. That was 1980. In the last year, I've often relied on that Congressional insurance. My wife, Vicki, and I have worried about many things, but not whether we could afford my care and treatment. Each time I've made a phone call or held a meeting about the health bill-or even when I've had the opportunity to get out for a sail along the Massachusetts coast-I've thought in an even more powerful way than before about what this will mean to others. And I am resolved to see to it this year that we create a system to ensure that someday, when there is a cure for the disease I now have, no American who needs it will be denied it.
Ted Kennedy
Joining with Democratic Sen. Edward "Ted” Kennedy in 2005, he made a valiant effort to enact comprehensive immigration reform - a crucial need that Congress has still not met. He proposed a "cap-and-trade” system to curb greenhouse gas emissions, defying Republicans who scorned climate change as a hoax.
Ted Kennedy
