Rudolph G. Penner Quotes

If Ottawa giveth, then Ottawa can taketh away.

All's the government should do is keep the taxes and regulations at a manageable rate, keep a decent standing army and get out of the way.

Accepting federal funding undermines state sovereignty as states become beholden to federal requirements in order to keep the money flowing.

Inserting the FCC into our states' economic and fiscal affairs sets a dangerous precedent and violates state sovereignty in a manner that warrants deeper examination.

The fact is there are a lot of things happening at the federal level that are absolutely beyond the jurisdiction of the Constitution. This is power that should be shifted back to the states, whether it's the EPA - there is no role at the federal level for the Department of Education.

One of my big beliefs about Washington is that we highly overstate the power of individuals and highly underrate seeing Washington as a system, in general, but, in particular, we highly underrate the power of Congress.

I believe that government is too large, costs too much, spends too much, and has too much regulatory power in our lives.

Congress may spend money in aid of the "general welfare.

The Congress is getting too powerful.

The budget is looked upon in the Congress as a way for a political party to promote itself.

The House of Representatives cannot only refuse, but they alone can propose the supplies requisite for the support of the government. They, in a word, hold the purse: that powerful instrument by which we behold in the in the history of the British constitution an infant and humble representation of the people, gradually enlarging the sphere of its activity and importance, and finally reducing, as far as it seems to have wished, all the overgrown prerogatives of the other branches of the government.

No branch of government should ever be able to combine the power of the sword with the power of the purse.

The legislative department is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex.

We go on in Congress as when you left us …. Resolves have been passed upon Resolves--and letter after letter has been sent to the deficient States, and all without the desired effect. We are without money or the prospect of it in the Federal Treasury; and the States, many of them, care so little about the Union, that they take no measures to keep a representation in Congress.

With Government funding comes regulation.

The power of the purse is the only real power of government.

We're not going to let some unelected bureaucrats in Washington stop us from moving forward with our agenda, but at the end of the day, CBO is not the Holy Grail.

The President cannot make clouds to rain and cannot make the corn to grow, he cannot make business good; although when these things occur, political parties do claim some credit for the good things that have happened in this way.

When you’re spending 24 billion dollars in pork barrel transportation projects how can you go to the American people and talk about tax increases.

The arm of the Federal government is long, but it is far too short to protect the rights of individuals in the interior of distant States. They must have the power to protect themselves, or they will go unprotected, in spite of all the laws the Federal government can put upon the national statute-book.

The debt limit does not affect the deficits or surpluses. The critical revenue and spending decisions are made through the congressional budget process.

A government may only govern so long as the people, through their representatives, vote it the money to carry on.

There is no such thing as a just and fair method of exercising the tremendous power that interventionism puts into the hands of the legislature and the executive.

Congress has the Constitutional responsibility to deal with the problem and Congress punted.

The desire of appropriations committee members to protect their prerogatives prevent Congress from effectively monitoring the intelligence community.