Gary Herbert Quotes

It seems with every new day, we have a new veto threat from the president.

Generally, the president's power and capital is used to close a deal and not always to negotiate bit by bit.

It seldom happens in the negotiation of treaties…but that perfect secrecy and immediate dispatch are sometimes requisite…and there doubtless are many [people] who would rely on the secrecy of the president, but who would not confide in that of the Senate, and still less in that of a large popular assembly.

Getting members of Congress to do things they don’t want to do is a crucial part of being President.

A president in his first year has a mandate and some political capital. When he picks an issue, he can practically roll any Congress.

It should be remembered that the president cannot, by executive order, do things that affects the public at large unless there is some Congressional basis for it.

What do we do with a president who can basically change what Congress passed by attaching a letter saying I don't agree with this part or that part?

The veto is a President's Constitutional right, given to him by the drafters of the Constitution because they wanted it as a checkagainst irresponsible Congressional action. The veto forces Congress to take another look at legislation that has been passed. I think this is a responsible tool for a president of the United States, and I have sought to use it responsibly.

Even the country's first president chafed at the limits placed on him by the writers of the U.S. Constitution. From the nature of the Constitution, ... I must approve all the parts of a bill, or reject it in toto.

A President has a great chance; his position is almost that of a king and a prime minister rolled into one.

They called me Veto Corleone. Because I vetoed 2,500 separate line-items in the budget.

The president began this program by executive order. He should immediately end it by executive order. For over a year now, he has said the program is illegal, and yet he does nothing.

You can't be citing Japanese internment camps for anything the president elect is going to do!

It is extraordinary that each of the three individuals this president [ George W. Bush] has nominated for the Supreme Court - Chief Justice [John] Roberts, Harriet Miers and now Judge Alito - has served not only as a lawyer for the executive branch, but has defended the most expansive view of presidential authority.

The only person who counts in the administration is the president of the United States.

When you're the commander in chief, you're the commander in chief on day one. You don't get like a six-month grace period. The world doesn't just stop and say, well, let's wait until the president catches up before we start challenging America.

I've got a pen, and I've got a phone, and I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive action. I've got a pen to talk executive actions where congress won't. Where congress isn't acting, I'll act on my own. I have got a pen and I got a phone. And that is all I need.

The president is supposed to execute faithfully the laws that the legislature has written. So, the executive orders that Barack Obama president is writing are without precedent. Without precedent so with he's rewriting law. It's totally illegal.

It is ridiculous to sue the president on a Wednesday because he oversteps the law, as he has done a dozen times illegally and unconstitutionally, and then on a Thursday say that he should overstep the law, contradict the law that passed in 2008 and deal with this himself.

When the president acts in absence of a congressional grant of authority, he can rely only upon his own independent powers. When the president takes measures incompatible with the express or implied will of Congress, his power is at its lowest ebb.

The power given by the Constitution to the Executive to interpose his veto is a high conservative power; but in my opinion it should never be exercised except in cases of clear violation of the Constitution, or manifest haste and want of due consideration by Congress.

I would be very, very strong on the debt limit. And I would be asking for a very big pound of flesh if I were the Republicans. And the problem with the Republicans, they have two sides. The smaller side is very strong and the other side is always agreeing and, you know, you can't do that.

No power but Congress can declare war, but what is the value of this constitutional provision, if the President of his own authority may make such military movements as must bring on war?

We have gone into a war, an unelected president sending us into a war that the Congress frankly had no right, I believe, to authorize.

I am committed against every thing which in my judgment, may weaken, endanger, or destroy (the Constitution) ... and especially against all extension of Executive power; and I am committed against any attempt to rule the free people of this country by the power and the patronage of the Government itself.