Dick Gephardt Quotes

If you go through the regular process of the House and Senate passing companion bills and then try and work out differences in the conference, maybe we can get something done.

The House of Representatives was not designed to sit idly by and rubberstamp every piece of legislation sent their way by the Senate, especially legislation passed on a straight party line vote under the spurious policy of reconciliation.

I learned some valuable lessons about the legislative process, the importance of bipartisan cooperation and the wisdom of taking small steps to get a big job done.

Gingrich, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, and Clinton passed legislation because they understood and appreciated the difficult political process. They fought for their principles yet recognized the need for compromise to get anything done.

I'm not a legislator. I've never been a lobbyist. I've never worked a session before, but based on my conversations with leadership in the Senate and the House, I get the general sense that people want to work together to make things happen.

The way it's supposed to work is you pass a bill out of the House, you pass a bill out of the Senate, you go to conference on it, and you iron out the differences.

In the House, I was named one of the most bipartisan members of Congress, and that's a title I plan on continuing to hold in the Senate.

Good policy usually comes from working across the aisle, and I believe tax reform needs to be tackled with Democrats and Republicans finding common ground.

[Donald Trump] has had the good judgment and common sense to get back with all these people, who have written the legislation already.

In the Senate, where 60 votes are required to do anything important, you have to work with your colleagues on both sides of the aisle.

The best thing for the American public is that we do our job. That Washington changes. That the Senate and the House get together and fix their differences and find common ground.

Though the views of members of the House and Senate are as divergent as the people we represent, we bear the responsibility to work through our political differences and get things done. That's our job.

The Reagan Administration, generally regarded as having conducted the most successful Transition of modern times, had managed during the election campaign to build bridges to the Democrats in some areas, notably foreign and national security policy.

I've thought about it, not a lot, but I thought my relationship with Congress - the Democrats and Republicans - would help me get some things done. Not everything, but at least they'd be willing to try.

The only bipartisanship you ever see is when they finally sign a bill and everybody says, 'Gee, isn't that wonderful?'

I hope the two wings of the Democratic Party may flap together.

My policy is I will help any policymaker who asks, whether they be a Republican or a Democrat.

You've got to have a theme if you're going to get Congress to do something difficult.

The Congress is the place where ordinary mortals go about the business of compromise—of compromise that gets us through the day.

There’s a sausage machine on Capitol Hill. We’ve given the sausage machine the right kind of ingredients. Now it’s up to the sausage machine to turn out the right kind of legislation.

The Democratic support against Barker [72 to 25] was so strong that they didn't even need us Republicans.

I am advised by Senator Hubert Humphrey that my information on the cooperation between Republicans and Democrats in the House of Representatives on the question of disarmament was not correct. My information stated that only one Republican sponsor could be found in the House and I am now told that there were 14.

Democrats legislate; Republicans investigate.

If we’re going to do all the things that the Constitution says that legitimately we can do as a country, … we have to be able to have a Congress where people can talk together like our Founding Fathers did.

Veterans are one area where Republicans and Democrats have made progress together.