Jennifer Palmieri Quotes

There's nothing to be said for opposition. You can only talk about things and you can lay your plans. You can't actually achieve very much; you have to be in government for that.

The actual rulers in a parliamentary democracy are the class of professional politicians. In theory, they are supposed to represent the people, but in fact they rule over them.

Issues affecting tribal communities have routinely been minimized and ignored.

For it is precisely because certain groups have no representation in a number of recognized political structures that their position tends to be so stable, their oppression so continuous.

It is well known that being a member of Parliament or holding a ministerial post affords one with political power that protects people from injustice. This power resembles that which was once held by tribal affiliations in the past.

We are the beast of state government.

How a minority, reaching majority, seizing authority, hates a minority.

Government is everywhere to a great extent controlled by powerful minorities, with an interest distinct from that of the mass of the people.

Congress is constantly engaged in a struggle for the respect of the people.

The people never have and never will be able to understand how the will of a majority of the House of Representatives can be set aside by the judgment of a few men on a powerful committee.

The Congress is getting too powerful.

People have nothing to lose. Government has stripped them of their dignity and their respect.

The needs of the many cannot be met by the party of the few.

Wherever the real power in a government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Government the real power lies in the majority of the community.

In the United States, where the numerical majority have long been in full possession of collective despotism, they would probably be as unwilling to part with it as a single despot or an aristocracy.

Political discussions fly over the heads of those who have no votes, and are not endeavoring to acquire them.

The elite interests must not crowd out the interests of the citizens.

There once was a time when people chose their congressmen. Now congressmen choose their people.

I think the government … has a very different interest. Usually in fact the opposite of what the people's interest is.

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

He was born to be a senator. He never said anything important, and he always said it sonorously.

Any railroad corporation has infinitely more influence in any department of government than all the human beings that live in the territory that the railroad traverses.

When I first went to Washington [the senate], I thought, what is l'il ole me doing with these ninety-nine great people? Now I ask myself, what am I doing with those ninety-nine jerks?

You let men in power assume power for the Little Man. But you yourself remain silent. You give men in power or impotent people with evil intentions the power to represent you. Only too late do you realize that again and again you are being defrauded

The Rules Committee is the place that Democracy comes to die.