Congress Quotes

The supreme majesty of the law and the power of this republican Government was illustrated anew to-day by the fresh scenes and proceedings in the great trial of impeachment. The business-like, almost matter-of-fact manner in which the Congress of the United States proceeds with this grave work is the most striking illustration of the innate love and reverence for law and order that characterize the American people.

Congress is supposed to fund the IRS, and it has been steadily reducing the number of auditors and tax collectors the IRS has at the very time that the tax system has become vastly more complicated. And of course America continues to grow, so there's an increasing number of tax returns coming in. The IRS responds by doing exactly what Congress expects of them. That shouldn't surprise anyone. All bureaucracies do what they are told.

If we take a Vessel of theirs, we get nothing but a bad Vessel fit only to burn, a few Guns and a few Barbarians who we may hang or enslave if We will, and the Unfeeling Tyrants whose Subjects they are will think will think no more of it than if We had killed so many CatterPillars upon an Apple tree. When they take a Vessel of ours, they not only get a rich prize, but they enslave the Men and if there is among them a Man of any Rank or Note, they demand most exorbitant ransoms for them … congress will never, or at least not for years, take any such resolution, and in the meantime our trade and honor suffers beyond calculation. We ought not to fight them at all unless we determine to fight them forever.

Spying on the prime minister of Israel and Congress has nothing to do with national security - only politics.

Congress: America's only true criminal class.

People don't give a damn what the average Senator or Congressman says. The reason they don't care is that they know that what you hear in Congress is 99 per cent tripe, ignorance and demagoguery and not to be relied on.

Sure the people are stupid: the human race is stupid. Sure Congress is an inefficient instrument of government. But the people are not stupid enough to abandon representative government for any other kind, including government by the guy who knows.

It is true that everything has been said, but not everyone has said it.

The House Republicans are not the enemy, they’re the opposition. The Senate is the enemy.

I make a prediction here and now, and, my friends, I want you to watch the proceedings of Congress in these coming weeks of this extra session, or of the next regular session, to see whether I am right or not.

While the budget resolution is a nonbinding blueprint, it is, nevertheless, an important guideline for Congress. Once the President's proposed budget is received by Congress on the first Monday of February, Congress generally goes to work on appropriating the funds required.

Any jackass can kick down a barn, but it takes a good carpenter to build one.

With whom is one supposed to do business in this country?

The difference between being a member of the House and being a member of the Senate is the difference between chicken salad and chicken shit.

I could end the deficit in 5 minutes. You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP, all sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election

Retaliation is sometimes mercy, mercy to both parties

As I say, I can't wait until Congress - half of Congress can get pregnant so we can quit fighting about birth control and Planned Parenthood.

A Senate chosen for six years will, in most instances, be an appointment for life, as the influence of such a body over the minds of the people will be coequal to the extensive powers with which they are vested, and they will not only forget, but be forgotten by their constituents.

Contrary to the narrative that Congress is racked by an inability to pass bills, the number of laws in our country has simply exploded. Less than 100 years ago, all of the federal government’s statutes fit into a single volume. By 2018, the U.S. Code encompassed 54 volumes and approximately 60,000 pages. Over the past decade, Congress has adopted an average of 344 new pieces of legislation each session. That amounts to 2 million to 3 million words of new federal law each year. Even the length of bills has grown—from an average of about two pages in the 1950s to 18 today.

I don't think they [Congress] ought to balance their budget on the backs of the poor.

The banks have discontinued themselves. We are now without any medium … necessity, as well as patriotism and confidence will make us all eager to receive Treasury notes if founded on specific taxes. Congress may now borrow of the public, and without interest, all the money they may want … by merely issuing their own promissory notes ….

Every country should be tired of going to war. War is a terrible thing. If I had been in Congress, as much as I would be inclined naturally to be supportive of a president, any president, I would have voted no, had the issue come to a vote.

War is best left to the Generals. I believe in letting the military authorities manage the army. If they manage it badly, we shall make a bad matter worse by tampering and interfering.

In effect, Hillary Clinton would be abolishing the lawmaking powers of Congress in order to write her own laws from the Oval Office. And you see what bad judgment she has. She has seriously bad judgment.

Apparently it's acceptable for members of Congress to own stock in companies we regulate in Congress, but somehow, our plumbing company crosses some line.