Political Quotes

“Mr. President, the most important three words in our Constitution are the first three words: ``We the People.'' Our Founders chose to write those words in supersized font so that we could, from some distance away, know exactly what the mission statement was. Their goal wasn't to write a structure for government that would repeat the governments of, by, and for the powerful of Europe but to pursue differently a vision in which the will of the people would be enacted; that government would work not just for the benefit of the citizens at large but also empowered by the citizens at large. This is a vision we have been very concerned about as we see the influence of the concentration of money in American politics. Indeed, we have five members of the Supreme Court who don't understand the basic, fundamental nature of the first three words of our Constitution. They adopted a court case, Citizens United, which was the opposite of the vision of our Constitution. That vision was articulated by Thomas Jefferson, who said that the will of the people will be enacted only if each and every citizen has an equal voice. But Citizens United gives a dramatic, stadium-sized megaphone to the individuals who are the richest and most powerful in the country, at odds with that fundamental vision that Lincoln so well summarized as government of, by, and for the people.…”