Paul O'Neill Quotes


I used some vivid language that, if I could take it back, I'd take it back. It's not my intention to be personally critical of the President or of anyone else.


Citations

Stevenson, Richard W. "Faced With Fierce Criticism, Ex-Treasury Chief Backs Off." The New York Times, 14 Jan. 2004, p. A1.

Related Quotes

In addition to the Attorney General, Washington’s cabinet consisted only of Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State, and Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury. Both were brilliant, passionate men dedicated to the new nation. However, they held opposite points of view on many major fundamental issues of political approach to the new nation. Washington greatly valued their advice and they each were magnificent administrators of their departments. However, they each distrusted each other intensely and believed that the other was advocating policies and practices that would destroy the new nation. Their squabbling was often public and Washington could never understand why they could not be civil about their disagreements. Ironically, Hamilton turned out to have been right about the assumption of state debt and the importance of business, finance and manufacturing. Jefferson whose vision had all Americans being farmers was wrong on this but was right on the limits of the executive and the rights of the individual vis a vis the government. Jefferson’s views turned out to be the ones most Americans wanted and his Democratic Republican party not only beat the Federalists but ended the Federalist Party. Hamilton died in a duel, Modern America is an amalgam of both of their views with modernity tending more and more towards Hamilton.


Paul O'Neill
Paul O'Neill
  • Born: December 4, 1935
  • Died: April 18, 2020
  • Nationality: American
  • Profession: Politician

Paul Henry O'Neill served as the 72nd United States Secretary of the Treasury for part of President George W. Bush's first term, from January 2001 to December 2002. He was fired in December 2002 for his public disagreement with the administration. Prior to his term as Secretary of the Treasury, O'Neill was chairman and CEO of industrial giant Alcoa and chairman of the RAND Corporation.