Political Quotes

“I managed to complete college because of the National Defense of Education Act, a bill passed by Congress, signed by President Eisenhower, that allowed me as a student from a working family to borrow money from the Federal Government to pay my college education and pay it back over 10 years at 3 percent interest. What a deal. I would sign up for it again. I hope those who were supporting it and reflecting on it believe that investment in this kid from East St. Louis and a lot of other children like me paid off for the country in the long haul. I think President Eisenhower and Congress were correct in calling this the national defense. When you talk about the national defense of America, I think it has a lot more to do with the people who live here than the hardware we purchase. The investment in education is such an investment. Think back to the turn of the century. If you had to go back 100 years and ask, Will America be a dominant country in the 21st century, most would guess no because in the 19th century we were a minor power. The European powers captured the attention of the world. We made some threshold decisions at the turn of the century that made a difference. I love this statistic: Between 1890 and 1920, on average, we built one new high school every day in America.”