Political Integrity Quotes

In an average day, you may well be confronted with some species of bullying or bigotry, or some ill-phrased appeal to the general will, or some petty abuse of authority. If you have a political loyalty, you may be offered a shady reason for agreeing to a lie or a half-truth that serves some short-term purpose. Everybody devises tactics for getting through such moments; try behaving "as if" they need not be tolerated and are not inevitable.

I suppose that an honest man shines more in politics than he does elsewhere.

Politics is a dirty business for a gentleman ...

Are you a politician who says to himself, 'I will use my country for my own benefit?' If so, you are naught but a parasite living on the flesh of others. Or are you a devoted patriot, who whispers in the ear of his inner self, I love to serve my country as a faithful servant." Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country?

It seems that in the world of politics, lying is not such a big deal.

Principles aren't of much account anyway, except at election time. After that you hang them up to let them season.

An honest man in politics shines more there than he would elsewhere.

Throughout my career, I have made rooting out public corruption a top priority.

I am proudly not a politician, because I am not behold to any special interest.

You must pursue this investigation of Watergate even if it leads to the president. I'm innocent. You've got to believe I'm innocent. If you don't, take my job.

And my whole life I've been focused on questions of anti-corruption laws, on constitutional law, and it's essential that the power of this office be maximized to stop corruption at the national level.

When the legislature is corrupted, the people are undone.

The hardest thing about a presidential election is how to win without proving that you are unworthy of winning.

Since a politician never believes what he says, he is surprised when others believe him.

If governments did not mislead their citizens so often, there would be less need for secrecy, and if leaders knew they could not rely on keeping the public in the dark about what they are doing, they would have a powerful incentive to behave better.

A politician that is poor is a poor politician.

This will not be disloyalty but will show that as members of a party they are loyal first to the fine things for which the party stands and when it rejects those things or forgets the legitimate objects for which parties exist, then as a party it cannot command the honest loyalty of its members.

I'm a politician. What I say is not holy writ.

You didn’t elect me to tell you what you wanted to hear. You elected me to tell you the truth.

In politics its almost as big a sin to change your mind as it is to be wrong.

During my first term in Congress, I signed a pledge that I will take no more earmarks and I've been faithful to that pledge.

I have two basic votes before I vote: is it constitutional, and is it in the interests of my people. If the answer is yes to both of them, then I vote for it, and I don't care who authored it.

We just need leaders in Congress who are honest with the American people.

We need clean candidates. Party A puts up a candidate and he is terribly corrupt. Party B puts up a candidate who is even more corrupt. There is no choice. So I have the Clean Candidate Campaign.

No man should have a political office because he wants a job.