Mark Warner: “I think as the two of us are here on the Senate floor, I am reminded that when Ben Franklin emerged from the…”

“I think as the two of us are here on the Senate floor, I am reminded that when Ben Franklin emerged from the Constitutional Convention, a reporter asked him: Well, what have the delegates to the convention rendered America? He said: A republic, if you can keep it. And this is the very essence of the Republic, if we can keep it, because here we are, two of the best of friends, proud to represent the Commonwealth of Virginia, and 90 percent of the time we are aligned. Yet our system allows the two of us to debate opposite positions on a piece of legislation I offered. I think that is magnificent, not only for our State but for the country.”