Calvin Coolidge Quotes

I think there's a lot to learn from Rockefeller on how to pass legislation.

Politics doesn't matter, policy does.

I do politics in order to do policy.

The challenge has been, we make policy in the world of politics.

Getting one bill passed is close to impossible. Ask any kid who has spent a summer in Washington, or better yet a semester, and can't understand how people tolerate its menu of constant frustration. Imagine mastering it.

I know how to take good ideas and turn them into sensible law at great odds.

Speaker Newt Gingrich has appointed a task force, which I'm on, and over the next couple months the task force is going to try to come up with legislation that does what we're all trying to do. I feel pretty good about the members that are on the task force.

I know how to make sausage, and now that I've seen how laws are made, I'll stick with sausage.

Legislating should be done in a manner that is understandable to the governed.

Nearly all legislation is the result of compromise.

Governments propose, and oppositions dispose.

Do you want to make a statement or do you want to make a law?

In the United States almost every political question becomes a legal question—or at least a question with legal dimensions.

There is something wrong with the way in which we make our decisions. The Government listen too much to the pollsters and the party managers. The trouble is that they are not even very good at politics, and they are entering too much into policy decisions. As a result, there is too much short-termism, too much reacting to events, and not enough shaping of events. We give the impression of being in office but not in power. Far too many important decisions are made for 36 hours' publicity.

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

I really focus on making sure that we pass good policy. I don't mind throwing my elbows around to get it done.

Our party's agenda is not only to form a government, but also to facilitate a political process.

I'm looking forward to going to Congress to pursue my Working Families Agenda and find areas of bipartisan agreement to move forward on important legislation.

If you think of big, legislative accomplishments, most of them kind of get initiated with the president putting something out there and Congress working on it.

It's important to remember that whatever the presidential candidates of either party say, they will have to interact with the United States Congress, particularly the Senate, when it comes to crafting policy.

Bad facts make bad law, and people who write bad laws are in my opinion more dangerous than songwriters who celebrate sexuality.

To me the function of politics is to make possible the desirable.

The man-made laws have been made by men who have not perceived the final goal towards which they are making. And that is why it is so important to insist upon the final thing first, and then all the regulations, all the disciplines, will follow.

People think that politics just somehow magically organizes itself. It doesn't work that way. You need to assemble these huge coalitions of 535 politicians on Capitol Hill, and tens of thousands of interest groups, and tens of millions of voters, and assemble all those in government to get stuff done.

It is with government as with medicine, its only business is the choice of evils. Every law is an evil, for every law is an infraction of liberty.