Great is the power, great is the authority of a senate that is unanimous in its opinions.
I believe if we introduced the Lord's Prayer here, senators would propose a large number of amendments to it.
I have been up to see the Congress and they do not seem to be able to do anything except to eat peanuts and chew tobacco, while my army is starving.
I have seen in the Halls of Congress more idealism, more humanness, more compassion, more profiles of courage than in any other institution that I have ever known.
If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonal experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain her rank among the nations.
Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.
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.
The American, if he has a spark of national feeling, will be humiliated by the very prospect of a foreigner's visit to Congress — these, for the most part, illiterate hacks whose fancy vests are spotted with gravy, and whose speeches, hypocritical, unctuous, and slovenly, are spotted also with the gravy of political patronage, these persons are a reflection on the democratic process rather than of it; they expose it in its process rather than of it; they expose it in its underwear.
The debates of that great assembly are frequently vague and perplexed, seeming to be dragged rather than to march, to the intended goal. Something of this sort must, I think, always happen in public democratic assemblies.
The Few assume to be the deputies, but they are often only the despoilers of the Many.
The Senate is a body of old men charged with high duties and misdemeanors.
There are two enemies to every bill proposed in Congress, the fools who favor it and the lunatics who oppose it.
There should be one day when there is open season on senators.
This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer.
This is a Senate of equals, of men of individual honor and personal character, and of absolute independence. We know no masters, we acknowledge no dictators. This is a hall for mutual consultation and discussion; not an arena for the exhibition of champions.
We have the power to do any damn fool thing we want to do, and we seem to do it about every ten minutes.
When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators.
With Congress, every time they make a joke it's a law, and every time they make a law it's a joke.