Anthony Foxx Quotes
There is no such thing as a Democratic or Republican road, bridge, port, airfield or rail system.
United States, Congress, Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Nomination of Hon. Anthony Foxx to be Secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation. Government Publishing Office, 22 May 2013, p. 13.
FDR had envisioned a national highway system. He had taken a map of the United States and drew three horizontal lines across the country and another three vertical lines running North to South. These he envisioned as a national highway system. The Second World War intervened with all men and material devoted to the war effort, highway ideas were all on the back burner. After the war President Dwight Eisenhower, in one of the great presidential achievements of American history, initiated the Federal National Highway System. The main difference was a reversal of the classic party positions. Democrat Roosevelt had planned to have the users pay for much or part of the construction and maintenance, while Republican Eisenhower accepted the entire burden on the general taxpayers and tolls and usage fees were banned on Federal Highways.
Although Madison vetoed the Federal bill to improve the national infrastructure, he was very much for the improvements and he said so in this veto message. He, however, did not see the Constitutional authority for the Federal government to appropriate moneys to be spent in the States for infrastructure improvement. He was for a Constitutional Amendment to do so or to make the improvements using State money as New York did building the Erie Canal. Alexander Hamilton, and many of the Congressmen who voted for the bill disagreed (many of whom were also in the Constitutional Convention) and did not see the Constitutional limitation that Madison did. See Hamilton’s Quote 644278. He was particularly concerned that small and less affluent states could not possibly have the skill to design these or the finances to build them. Later President’s and Congresses sided with Hamilton. It would be hard to envision America today of Madison’s view had prevailed.
The notion of government subsidies to private companies that performed valuable pubic services—public-private partnerships was used extensively by Clinton and was one of reasons that New York developed faster than the other Colonies. At the formation of America, Virginia and Pennsylvania were much bigger and wealthier states than New York. In large part, Clinton led the rapid growth and development.
Anthony Renard Foxx is an American politician and lawyer who served as the United States Secretary of Transportation from 2013 to 2017. Previously, he served as the Mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, from 2009 to 2013. He is a member of the Democratic Party. First elected to the Charlotte City Council in 2005, upon his 2009 mayoral victory he became the youngest mayor of Charlotte and the second African American mayor.
