Political Quotes

“I thank my friend from New Mexico. I also thank him for his great leadership on the constitutional option. I am a cosponsor of his resolution, which he sent to the desk earlier today. He is right on target. The dead hand of the past cannot bind us. Every Congress, on the first legislative day--as Senator Byrd said himself in the past-- has the authority, with 51 Senators, to set our rules--not two-thirds, just 51. We are on that first legislative day today. I understand the leader will put us into recess so we will stay in the first legislative day when we come back. So we will be on this issue when we come back on January 25. I wonder if I might explore a little bit with my friends who are here--and the Senator from Oregon has been a great leader in this effort. As a former speaker of the legislature in Oregon, he has lent a great deal of expertise to our thinking and in evolving how we modify our rules to make this place function a little better. I thank Senator Merkley for his leadership. A lot of what was in the measure that Senator Udall sent to the desk earlier today is what Senator Merkley has devised. These are things we need to do. I ask again to bring this up here for maybe a brief discussion, if I might. This is something Senator Cornyn and I got into a little bit earlier. He went on at length about building consensus; that we want to build consensus and have bills over here with a consensus. Well, I agree with that. You try to get as much consensus as possible.…”