Robert J. Bentley Quotes

No business is above government, and government must be empowered to deal adequately with any business that tries to rise above government.

Rational as distinguished from vindictive regulation by public authority turns out to be an extremely delicate problem which not every government agency, particularly when in full cry against big business, can be trusted to solve.

I do not believe that the government is in any position to say exactly how every single business and every single activity shall reach those performances.

To say that only those businesses affected with a public interest may be regulated is but another way of stating that all those businesses which may be regulated are affected with a public interest.

Why has it seemed that the only way to protect the environment is with heavy-handed government regulation?

I would have never run for office if it wasn't for the fact that my biggest threat to my company was the federal government and the overreach of the EPA. They've gone too far, and it's time for them to be pulled back in.

As presidents from Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama have recognized, the real question is whether regulations, whether new or old, are justified. That requires a careful analysis of their costs and their benefits.

What one has created by regulation, one could address by regulation.

There are lots of levels of fear and complaint about the government getting involved in business. First and foremost, of course, is incompetence.

Many businesses oppose any government mandates, even if they are already following them.

In a literal sense, even a private company, of course, cannot do everything that it wants without some discussion with government. As a good corporate citizen, Severstal discussed the idea of a merger with Arcelor with the Russian government.

Is regulation per se bad? Is better regulation bad? I think better regulation is good for the business community, and I think that's something we should get together on.

I've spent enough time in the business community to know there are certain regulators who are very constructive in their approach - those who enforce the laws and who actually want to help you comply - and there are others who have a prosecutorial attitude.

Here in the UK the government has decided to accept the recommendations of the Better Regulation Task Force to measure and make targeted reductions in the administrative costs - the red tape costs - that regulations impose on business.

I tell them the rules are made by the government. Every firm should comply. It doesn't mean they can't compete.

Let's not allow the voice of the people to be overwhelmed by the siren song of those who opposed regulation, who demanded that government should stand aside and let finance and business run the show.

The duty of government is to leave commerce to its own capital and credit as well as all other branches of business, protecting all in their legal pursuits, granting exclusive privileges to none.

It was while starting my business that I saw my first glimpse of government's impact on business.

The Right's view of government and the Left's view of big business are both correct.

Only the corporation that shirks from the light would have anything to fear from government. About the welfare of such corporations we need not be over-sensitive.

The steps which my predecessor took and the legislation passed on his recommendation have accomplished much, have caused a general halt in the vicious policies which created popular alarm, and have brought about in the business world a much higher regard for existing law.

It should be as much the aim of those who seek social betterment to rid the business world of crimes of cunning as to rid the entire body politic of crimes of violence.

Fines have to be incentives to enforce the law. We cannot allow them to become just another cost of doing business

I do not dread these corporations as instruments of power to destroy this country, because there are a thousand agencies which can regulate, restrain and control them.

We can continue to have a policy in which the public interest means whatever they [broadcasters and communications companies] want it to mean in order to make money. Or we can give it real meaning.