William Maclay Quotes

Believe me, Germany is unable to wage war.

If the president is failing to disclose material facts with regard to legislation being presented to the Congress on a question as important as war and peace, I think it does impair the level of trust that the House and the Senate have for this administration.

American boys should not be seen dying on the nightly news. Wars should be over in three days or less, or before Congress invokes the War Powers Resolution.

There's no excuse for skimping on national defense when the country is at war.

The Congress decides when to make war and the President decides how to make war.

The shortest way to peace is the most stupendous and unanimous preparation for war.

Terrour ... makes short warres

It can’t be any other than madness to commence hostilities before we have established resources on a sure plan for certain and effectual military supplies. Men in that case will not be wanting.

In peace, as a wise man, he should make suitable preparation for war.

There are two things that will always be difficult for a democratic people to do: to start a war and to finish it

Checks and balances, in time of war, are more important than ever.

Under our Constitution the Congress alone has the power to declare war.

For any rational political leader, war is indeed unthinkable, but two huge military bureaucracies in the two countries [Russia and America] are paid to think about it every day, to plan for it, and to develop scenarios for "winning." The madness of one bureaucracy sustains the other. The technological nightmare into which we have entered is an environment that chokes rational thought.

The Commonwealth of Venice in their armoury have this inscription, "Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war.

My home policy? I wage war. My foreign policy? I wage war. Always, everywhere, I wage war.

We can always find money for what the military wants.

The concept of military readiness is well understood, but readiness for what happens after the fighting stops is just as important.

We shall certainly not drift into war, but go to war if we do, because we intend it and have a purpose we mean to accomplish.

A Taliban collapse could be rapid, with the enemy shrinking to a small number of hard-core Mullah Omar supporters in the early days or weeks of a military campaign.

In no part of the Constitution is more wisdom to be found than in the clause which confides the question of war and peace to the legislature.... [War is] the true nurse of executive aggrandizement.

Uncle Sam’s Latest Greatest Shortest War

It is better to make our enemy's country the theater of war than our own.

Big armies have always brought, not peace, but war which has ended in a hate that in due course brings another war.

In no part of the Constitution is more wisdom to be found than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature, and not to the executive department. ... War is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement. In war, a physical force is to be created; and it is the executive will which is to direct it. In war, the public treasures are to be unlocked; and it is the executive hand which is to dispense them. ... It is in war, finally, that laurels are to be gathered, and it is the executive brow they are to encircle. The strongest passions and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast; ambition, avarice, vanity, the honorable or venial love of fame, are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace

In time of actual war, great discretionary powers are constantly given to the Executive Magistrate. Constant apprehension of War, has the same tendency to render the head too large for the body.