Elizabeth Esty Quotes

It is not easy to stand up against your constituents or your friends or colleagues or your community and take a tough stand for something you believe is right. Because you always want to keep working and live to fight another battle and it might cost you your career.

What makes America amazing is that there have always been men and women of courage who were willing to think more about the future of their children and grandchildren than they did about their own political careers.

Let's put aside the politics and trust the people. Let's embrace the unique opportunity we all have; take the heat and make the hard and difficult decisions, knowing that we're doing it to make things better for the people of Illinois.

I am a patriot. I would think there are no politicians who are not patriots. Since I am a politician, I often get criticized as I try to exercise what I believe to be right. However, if you mind such criticism, I think you can't protect people's lives.

My friends, history, history calls us to this time and to this place. A solemn choice rests with us - where do we go from here? Do we move slowly and incrementally? Or do we seize the challenge of our time and tackle the great issues of our day.

Politics requires the sense of possibility. Dare I say it - the audacity of hope.

My outspoken positions haven't always been popular in the halls of Congress, but they have been rooted in what I believed was right and necessary.

The leader is supposed to represent the community, the public good. He's supposed to be the focal point and the guide and the inspiration, and to represent a concern for the public good. The trouble is, the tragic problem is, very often, when you are a leader and pursue the public good, it may be at the expense of your private interests in a very drastic way

If you're asked, you've got to serve - put aside any reservations based on campaign rhetoric... and figure out what's best for the country.

It's incredibly important that I decided to serve my country before deciding to run for office.

Political courage reads well in editorials, but it doesn't translate into political reality.

Beloved. You are as brave a man as Harry Truman—or FDR—or Lincoln. You can go on to find some peace, some achievement amidst all the pain. You have been strong, patient, determined beyond any words of mine to express …. To step out now would be wrong for our country, and I can see nothing but a wasteland for your future. Your friends would be frozen in embarrassed silence and your enemies jeering.

Our politics, our public life and thought rise not to the level of our opportunity.

…working not for the small pleasures of today but for the future security and improvement of the race.

It is time that we labored for the happiness of the people. Legislators who are to bring light and order into the world must pursue their course with inexorable tread, fearless and unswerving as the sun.

It's time to put country ahead of party. It's time to put the next generation ahead of the next election.

If you really want to help your country, sometimes you have to make uncomfortable decisions.

We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community...Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own

I'm one of these guys who believes you represent the people who sent you to Washington, D.C., not matter what the cost. The cost could be very grave.

That's why I want to change Mississippi. You don't run away from problems - you just face them.

I push reforms. I tell the truth to people, even when it's tough for the country.

It is our job, our responsibility as their representatives to help them. If we choose not to do that, we should not be their representatives.

The only reward in a public life is public progress. You stand back and say, 'What did I get out of it?' You look around, and the place is better, and that's it.

When you are in politics, and you are a genuine person who genuinely cares, then everything comes second.

Only he has the calling for politics who is sure that he shall not crumble when the world from his point of view is too stupid or too base for what he wants to offer.