Political Quotes

“Madam President, I appreciate the thoughtful words of my friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from Delaware. I am grateful anytime someone is willing to recognize that I have been a consistent champion of federalism and localism, self-rule. He and I agree that those principles are important. My friend from Delaware, being a former Governor himself, understands the sovereignty of the States and the need to respect their judgment. This is a different circumstance here than that. This would absolutely be inappropriate for us, in any other circumstance, to tell a State or any political subdivision of any State--a city, town, a county, any other subunit of one of our 50 sovereign States--it would be inappropriate for us to weigh in on a local policy issue like this. It is, in fact, part of our constitutional design that each State and each community within each State needs to be able to express itself and make its own decisions based on its own unique preferences. Here is a very significant difference with respect to the District of Columbia. It has its own provision of the Constitution--in fact, its own clause in article I, section 8, known as the enclave clause. This provision, found in article I, section 8, clause 17, gives Congress exclusive legislative jurisdiction over what we now call the District of Columbia. It wasn't called that in 1787, when they wrote this.…”