Quotes

Opposition to capital punishment has built from the ground up. It is evident in the greater part of America’s counties where people realize that, in addition to being barbaric, capricious and prohibitively expensive, the death penalty does not reflect their values.

I think that it is high time for the United States Senate and its members to do some soul-searching -- for us to weigh our consciences -- on the manner in which we are performing our duty to the people of America -- on the manner in which we are using or abusing our individual powers and privileges.

The powers relating to impeachment are an essential check in the hands of the body of the legislature against and upon the encroachments of the executive. The division between the two branches of the legislature, the House and the Senate, assigning to the one the right to accuse and to the other the right to judge, the framers of this Constitution were very astute. They did not make the accusers and the judgers -- and the judges the same person.

There is nothing wrong with our country, there is something wrong with our politics…When this country is operating off a common ground, nobody can stop us. But when we’re divided, then we end up having a whole lot of self-inflicted problems.

It may have appeared messy. It might have appeared to some like their government wasn’t working. But, in fact, the opposite was true. The push and pull Americans saw in Washington these past few weeks was not gridlock. It was the will of the people working itself out in a political system that was never meant to be pretty.

I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their ‘early baptismal or circumcision certificates’...This is a bridge too far.

Nothing improves workplace morale like labeling some employees ‘essential’ and others ‘nonessential.

This is childish. Am I supposed to take it home and get my mother to sign it?

The enumerated powers of Congress…have been way, way too broadly construed.

Human dignity is a little bit outside the scope of cost-benefit analysis.

Although a lot of senators do everything they can to avoid taking tough votes. But every single vote I've taken has been tough for me.

We too often assume that when a law passes, people know it passed, and they know what’s in it, and they know how it applies to them.