Thomas Jefferson Quotes

I would argue that one of the issues which the public should be much more emphatic about with all politicians... is patronage, appointing people to high positions because they supported your campaign or helped you raise money.

What we affirm is that the theory which regards places in the public service as prizes to be distributed after an election, like plunder after a battle, the theory which perverts public trusts into party spoils, making public employment dependent on favor and not on proved merit, necessarily ruins the self-respect of public employees, destroys the function of party in a republic, prostitutes elections into a desperate strife for personal profit, and degrades the national character by lowering the moral tone and standard of the country.

Nepotism is an overrated debate. It exists everywhere and I have been telling this from the day one.

Dictators can fix up their entire families in good jobs, in or around government, and often do. In democracies, such a practice is frowned upon. Privileged access to the corridors of power through family connections and a kind of old boys' network, is also deemed an abuse of power, and so it is.

Public office is supposed to be a public trust. This is a clear sign of the rampant corruption at the highest levels of the Republican leadership.

Nepotism sometimes can be a lose-lose situation.

The stimulus was a case of political patronage, corporate welfare, and cronyism at their worst.

… procuring offices for persons who were unfit, and unworthy of them … squandering away the public treasure

The assumption has to be that members of Congress are, like eunuchs in a harem, physically incapable of a conflict of interest.

Wouldn't a judge be a "rotter," if he got an appointment for the Supreme Court bench from a district leader for 14 years at a salary of $25,000 a year and then just said "Thank you"?

There are, perhaps, few men who can for any great length of time enjoy office and power without being more or less under the influence of feelings unfavorable to the faithful discharge of their public duties. Their integrity may be proof against improper considerations immediately addressed to themselves, but they are apt to acquire a habit of looking with indifference upon the public interests and of tolerating conduct from which an unpracticed man would revolt. Office is considered as a species of property, and government rather as a means of promoting individual interests than as an instrument created solely for the service of the people.

Before I was elected to Congress, I helped to create the public corruption unit in the office of Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan. Unfortunately, business was good. Among the usual suspects were government contracts steered to insiders - leaving Illinois taxpayers holding the bag.

The President should not be able to enrich himself and his family at taxpayer expense, period.

Patronage is almost a wicked word. By itself it could well-nigh defeat democracy.

By reason of gifts and bribes the offices be given to rich men, which should rather have been executed by wise men.

The fact that I'm sleeping with the director may have something to do with it.

Every single administration in American political history has put cronies and pals and donors into political positions. But normally those people become the ambassador to Liechtenstein or the deputy undersecretary of commerce.

It's an intolerable abuse of power to have employees who are supposed to be advancing the public interest actually working on political campaigns.

The U.S. army confirmed that it gave a lucrative fire fighting contract in Iraq to the firm once run by the Vice President Dick Cheney without any competitive bidding. When asked if this could be conceived as Cheney's friends profiting from the war, the spokesman said 'Yes.'

Modi government has not flouted any rule or regulation to help anyone.

Public office must not be a means to profit or become rich.

No person connected with me by blood or marriage will be appointed to office.

When the Lord Chancellor violates the trust of his great office of state to solicit party donations from people whose careers he can control, and then says I'm not sorry, and I'd do it again no wonder the public think that power has gone to their heads.

Whether I'm reading a national publication or one of my local Chicago newspapers, I don't need to turn too many pages before I stumble upon another scandal. Not only do ethics violations deteriorate the public trust, but they also disrupt and undermine legitimate debate and policy.

When a Cabinet Minister who is sacked for telling lies is re-appointed, in the face of every constitutional convention, only for the same man to be sacked again from the same Cabinet for the same offence by the same Prime Minister no wonder the public are cynical about politics.