Raoul Berger Quotes
You don’t need more hearings. You need more gumption. You’ll be treated like office boys until you stand up and kick them [the Nixon White House] in the slats.
Raoul Berger, 1901-2000, Constitutional & Legal Historian, Advice to Congress regarding the balance of power with the White House, Testimony, Senate Hearings on Executive Privilege, 1973
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
In the early 1970's Congress began to assert itself in foreign policy. An amendment was proposed by Mike Mansfield to halve the troops committed to NATO:
Builder of over 90 percent of the U. S. Navy World War II Boats. Frequent expression when challenged by established boat and ship builders on his claims of how many and how fast he could build boats for the World War II Navy. Higgins and his lumber company had little experience at boat building, but he recruited and trained Blacks and women and delivered over 20,000 vessels to the Navy.
The Congress over the last century has ceded much of its Constitutional power to the President. Congress has much power to check the President, but just as Congress has not been very competent at legislating, oversight, and conducting hearings and investigations, it has not organized itself to use the powers it has very well.
Raoul Berger was an American attorney and professor at The University of California at Berkeley and Harvard Law School. While at Harvard, he was the Charles Warren Senior Fellow in American Legal History. He is known for his role in the development of originalism.
