Archibald Cox Quotes

Special interests and Congress are too closely connected and the ties that bind are the millions spent on campaigns.

Money in politics leads to bad things—and I am bipartisan in that view.

This [political fundraising] is a very sophisticated system … This is a legalized bribery system where no one has to say anything. I don’t have to say what I want—you [the politician] know what I want.

Not since the gilded age has our politics been opened so wide to corporate contribution and donations from secret sources.

The use of billions of dollars to fund election campaign and pay lobbyists to author legislation is not politics. It is legalized bribery.

Money has too big an influence on our politics in Washington and somehow we need to do something about that.

The reality is that asking the public to fund political campaigns accomplishes nothing. Candidates continue to seek interest-group support through other channels, both financial and in-kind, and corruption problems abound.

Our form of democracy is bribery, on the highest scale.

Billionaires like the Koch brothers, casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, and political puppet master Karl Rove should not be able to buy our elections. Secret money should not be able to drown out the voices of the American people and sell our Democracy to the highest bidder.

America has the best congress money can buy.

Money in politics is like ants in your kitchen. You close all the holes and get them all out or they'll find their way in again.

Politicians can be bought and often are.

It challenges a linguist to define modern campaign contributions as something other than bribery.

If not checked the power of money will soon control the elections of the President, the senators and the members of the House of representatives.

Congress has become the center of legalized bribery/

The Federal campaign contribution limit of $2,500 is way too low. You can’t even buy a Democrat for $2,500.

Today’s expensive election campaigns are entrenching a culture of patronage [in Indonesia].

Until we make campaigns affordable, then we're going to have too many members of Congress out rattling the cup with special interest groups.

Our entire political system is financed by wealthy private interests buying politicians and making sure the rules are written in their favor.

When one donor can account for more than 70 percent of a candidate's money, there's obviously something wrong with the system.

Big money has hijacked our politics.

I would do away with super PACs. I think it's a cancer.

The SuperPACs and the Citizens United ruling that gives corporations a voice in the political process are all bad news. They made it so you can now lie, and the politician being promoted on that lie will not be held responsible for it.

We have to get rid of the constant fundraising that happens inside the Congress. Before, political parties used to raise money; now, individual members are raising money through the DCCC and the RCCC. It is absolutely corrupt.

There are a lot of grotesqueries in politics, not the least of which is the fund-raising side.