Robert M. Gates Quotes

I will continue to ask the president and his subordinates to work with Congress rather than against it.

In our system of democracy, our government works on a system of checks and balances. Instead of stripping power from the courts, I believe we should follow the process prescribed in our Constitution - consideration of a Constitutional amendment.

… take the Constitution out of cold storage!

From time to time we must remind ourselves that the President has a role in the legislative process.

We have a constitution that says that the way you get things is by passing legislation, not by threatening to destroy the country unless you get your way.

The Constitution was made chiefly because of the demands of Commerce.

It is becoming more widely acknowledged that it is better to have a good constitution than not having a perfect one.

There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.

I am not a federal employee. I am a constitutional officer. My job is the Constitution of the United States, I am not a government employee. I am in the Constitution.

I don't order laws, I propose them.

Government is necessary for our survival. We need government in order to survive. The Founding Fathers created a special place for government. It is called the Constitution.

As a member of Congress, I believe Congress must provide oversight of actions by the Executive Branch as our system of checks and balances requires.

It matters enormously to a successful democratic society like ours that we have three branches of government, each with some independence and some control over the other two. That's set out in the Constitution.

The people in Congress have no interest in preserving the Constitution because they are interested in power.

Congressmen take an independent oath to protect and defend the Constitution. They work with the President; they do not work for the President.

You run Washington DC though the House. The Senate gets in the way. The President gets in the way.

Federal bureaucracies are creatures of Congress, not the executive.

I have found a reality in life, and that reality is the United States Congress.

Governments propose, and oppositions dispose.

Congress has a lot of powers which people, especially those in the executive branch, don't like to talk about.

The federal courts do not sit as an ombudsman, refereeing the disputes between the other two branches.

The independence of the legislative arm must be respected. I had little taste for forcing Congressional action.

The legislature makes, the executive executes, and the judiciary construes the law; but the maker of the law may commit something to the discretion of the other departments, and the precise boundary of this power is a subject of delicate and difficult inquiry.

The power to make war is vested in Congress and not in the President. Congress has no constitutional authority to grant such authority to the president.

The Founders of this Nation entrusted the lawmaking power to the Congress alone in both good and bad times … the President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is to be a law-maker.