Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, before I begin, I want to thank the distinguished Congresswoman from New York for her comments about Francis Bellamy, the great Christian abolitionist and socialist who authored America's Pledge of Allegiance. He was a great patriot who wanted to unify the country in the wake of the Civil War during the Reconstruction Period. We, indeed, owe him a great debt of gratitude for everything he did for America. Mr. Speaker, I want to talk about a matter of pressing importance and urgency to the people of America today. It is the question of gun violence and what Congress is doing about the problem of gun violence. I want to start by invoking something that all of the schoolchildren of America know about, which is the idea of a social contract. You can go back and read John Locke or Thomas Hobbes, or Rousseau, but all of them began with the idea that, in the state of nature, we are all in a dangerous and perilous condition because there is no law. It is the rule of the jungle. Hobbes said that the state of nature was a condition that was solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. Because of that, people enter into civil society to create a government. The first principle of government is that we have got to protect our people. As Cicero put it, the safety and good of the people must be the highest law. That is why we have a social contract. But, Mr.…”