Paul Jennings Quotes

In the year 1857, passing through Washington on our return from the annual visit to Philadelphia, I had the distinguished honor of visiting a President for the first time.

Mrs. Madison was a remarkably fine woman. She was beloved by everybody in Washington, white and colored. Whenever soldiers marched by, during the war, she always sent out and invited them in to take wine and refreshments, giving them liberally of the best in the house…. In the last days of her life, before Congress purchased her husband's papers, she was in a state of absolute poverty, and I think sometimes suffered for the necessaries of life. While I was a servant to Mr. (Daniel) Webster, he often sent me to her with a market-basket full of provisions, and told me whenever I saw anything in the house that I thought she was in need of, to take it to her. I often did this, and occasionally gave her small sums from my own pocket, though I had years before bought my freedom of her.

James Madison was the Speaker of the House. But he also wrote many speeches for George Washington. He even wrote some of Washington’s Messages to Congress. Then as the Speaker, he would write the reply to Washington’s message that he had written.

Sitting in the Oval Office, beneath a painting of George Washington, with a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. over his right shoulder and a bust of Abraham Lincoln over his left shoulder, Obama told 'National Journal' that the country's economic woes are deep and endemic.

I was eight when he left office. Like, he had an awesome house, you know, and my cousins and I had awesome trips to Camp David and Washington. It was just all like a good time for me.

I walked out of Spielberg's 'Lincoln' having such a thirst for more. It used such a microscopic albeit enormous event in American history. It used such a small piece of his presidency to illustrate him as a president through the lens of that event.

Bill Clinton beat Bush's father, President George H. W. Bush, for the White House in 1992 by focusing on 'the economy, stupid' - and Clinton's victory led, in time, to the longest sustained boom in American history.

When the citizens of Baltimore banded together to repel the British during the War of 1812, three in five were immigrants, and one in five was black - some were free, some slaves.

Washington's birthday is worthy of celebration - he is one of the greatest men in history. But Washington himself would likely have seen celebration of the office of the presidency itself as monarchic in nature.

On the evening of December 25, General Washington in a most severe season crossed the Delaware with a part of his army, then reduced to less than 2000 men in the whole.

This is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.

I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of God than live in that palace at Washington [the White House.]

The men who have had great vision in the White House are those who are most enduring in the minds of the public. America loves visionary Presidents.

In August, 1814, the enemy had got so near, there could be no doubt of their intentions. Great alarm existed, and some feeble preparations for defense were made. Comodore Barney's flotilla was stripped of men, who were placed in battery, at Bladensburg, where they fought splendidly. A large part of his men were tall, strapping negroes, mixed with white sailors and marines. Mr. Madison reviewed them just before the fight, and asked Com. Barney if his "negroes would not run on the approach of the British?" "No sir," said Barney, "they don't know how to run; they will die by their guns first." They fought till a large part of them were killed or wounded; and Barney himself wounded and taken prisoner. One or two of these negroes are still living here.

All ladies arriving here as strangers it seems expect to be visited by the wives of the heads of the departments and even by the President’s wife. Mrs. Madison subjected herself to this torture, … but from which having begun the practice, she never found an opportunity of receding from.

It looks like it’s been furnished by discount stores.

Jefferson, Madison and Washington could not survive in today’s political environment.

I will make a prophecy that may now sound peculiar. In fifty years Lincoln's name will be inscribed close to Washington's on this Republic's roll of honor.

One of the most remarkable occurrences of the army has this moment taken place. Park Spring, the telegraph operator, situated in Prof. Lowe’s balloon, at an elevation of one thousand feet….is freely and rapidly communicating with the Department at Washington. This is certainly an ingenious and valuable method of giving instantaneous information.

My great-grandfather fought with the Colonial Army in New England in the American Revolution.

What's been largely forgotten is that Washington was highly passionate and aggressive, and it was only after losing Philadelphia to the British after a string of disastrous battlefield performances that he finally resigned himself to the more conservative approach with which he has since become associated.

For President Bush, the first, the 41st president, George Herbert Walker Bush, I spent all 4 years of his presidency on the staff for the National Security Council.

George H.W. Bush had perhaps the greatest resume in American history. Director of the CIA, ambassador to the U.N., envoy to China, vice president of the United States and then, of course, president. It's staggering to contemplate one person achieving so much.

I understand Jacqueline Kennedy has redone the White House in eighteenth-century style. Why, then, I'd fit in perfectly.

I cannot tell a lie.