Greg Walden Quotes

The era of big government is over, but the era of big challenge is not. We need an era of big citizenship. There are many important people at this summit, but the most important title is 'citizen.' This is our republic. Let us keep it!

The government is just the people acting together.

In the past, young, talented architects worked together to form a strong social agenda and communicate with a larger audience. That's what today's architecture community should be.

I happen to love buildings, and my passion is bringing people together.

People don't talk to each other. You're alone with your television set or internet. But you can't have a functioning democracy without what sociologists call "secondary organizations," places where people can get together, plan, talk and develop ideas. You don't do it alone.

Any participation, even in the smallest public function, is useful.

Democrats believe that government should reflect the sense of community that Americans demonstrated after Katrina - the sense of community that has defined and united America throughout its history.

I would've been intrigued by being a film director. I would've been intrigued by politics. I thought about architecture.

The government is us; we are the government, you and I.

Politics is a people business. I like people.

Of course I believe imaginative architecture can make a difference to people's lives, but I wish it was possible to divert some of the effort we put into ambitious museums and galleries into the basic architectural building blocks of society.

If the private sectors are about markets and the public sectors are about governments, then the plural sector is about communities.

You need a prince to make a town in an intellectual sense. Developers want to make money. If they cared about architecture, they'd become architects. I've had so many projects that never came off because they had no sponsor, and not because they were utopian. I just want to build a town that's normal.

The Latin root of the word 'politics' means 'of the people.' Politics is about something bigger than electoral politics; in that sense, I feel like I'm already involved.

Government can contribute to a shared sense of purpose on the part of the citizenry; that's its highest and best application.

A democracy is more than a form of government; it is primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience.

The Democrats have prevailed because at heart we have embodied a great idea, which is that an elected government can be the instrument of the common purpose of a free people; that government can embrace great causes and do great things.

Democracy, in any active sense, begins and ends in communities small enough for their members to meet face to face.

Not stones, nor wood, nor the art of artisans make a state; but where men are who know how to take care of themselves, these are cities and walls.

By the people for the people.

A government is invigorated when each of us is willing to participate in shaping the future of this nation

Government is not an enemy of the people. Government is the people themselves.

We have to take our democracy back. We cannot leave it to Facebook or Snapchat or anyone else. We have to take democracy back and renew it. Society is about people and not about technology.

I started my career as an urban planner, working for the city, doing what I would call 'do-gooder' things, particularly for low-income neighborhoods.

I'm convinced democracy will grow from the ground up, from the community.