Presidential Symbolism Quotes

I think 'Hail to the Chief' has a nice ring to it.

Most of these people habitually led rather gray lives. And they came to see the president much as they would have come to see the circus. It was something to talk over and remember and tell their children about. But I think that besides the mere curiosity there was good feeling behind it all, a feeling that the president was their man and symbolized their government, and that they had a proprietary interest in him and wished to see him and that they hoped he embodied their aspirations and their best thoughts.

Ronald Reagan would never go into the Oval Office without his jacket on - that's how much he revered the presidency.

It would never do for the President to have guards with drawn sabers at his door, as if he fancied he were, or were trying to be, assuming to be, an Emperor.

Where Reagan channeled disenchantment with overweening government, Obama symbolized America's transformation into a multiracial country.

The presidency is, in many ways, America's comment on itself; our collective national costume. In the occupant of our sole nationwide elected office, we see who we think we are, or who we want to be.

It is well to remember that the office of Chief Executive is in part a symbol of the nation and that leaders in a nation may differ in their own house but they have instant solidarity in the presence of foreign attack

When you get to be President, there are all those things, the honors, the twenty-one gun salutes, all those things. You have to remember it isn't for you. It's for the Presidency.

Even the notion that, you know,[Bill] Clinton was the black president strikes me as the greatest irony of all times.

As soon as a regular guy like Bill Clinton becomes the president, he wears a mantle of greatness. He's the president.

One of the things that you come pretty early on to understand in this job, and you start figuring out even during the course of the campaign, is that there's Barack Obama the person and there's Barack Obama the symbol, or the office holder, or what people are seeing on television, or just a representative of power. And so when people criticize or respond negatively to me, usually they're responding to this character that they're seeing on TV called Barack Obama, or to the office of the presidency and the White House and what that represents.

We need a little more 'Hail to the Chief.'

I suppose we should all sing "Bail to the Chief.

The way we think about a presidential portrait is one that is imbued with dignity from the outset.

Baseball is the president tossing out the first ball of the season. And a scrubby schoolboy playing catch with his dad on a Mississippi farm.

Mitterrand had a sense for symbols, and he was the first Socialist president since 1958. He wanted to show that there is historical continuity, a connection with the great figures of French history.

What actor doesn't want to walk around a set and be called 'Mr. President?' Playing POTUS is a kind of rite of passage among American actors - our version of playing Hamlet.

The function of president in France is one of significant symbolic value; it can't be compared with that of prime minister or cabinet member. Everything you do, everything you say - but also what you don't say - suddenly has meaning. That might sound quite formidable or even stressful, but I think it is a product of the history of this role.

Perhaps the mistake I made at the start of my mandate is not understanding the symbolic dimension of the president's role and not being solemn enough in my acts. A mistake for which I would like to apologise or explain myself and which I will not make again. Now, I know the job.