Robert C. Byrd

We owe our children a clean, healthy environment in which they can raise their families. We also owe them a vibrant, healthy economy in which they can realize their greatest dreams.

It is possible to have an adequate and secure energy supply without serious or detrimental effect on the environment. It is possible to preserve our industrial strength and lay the groundwork for future economic growth and stability…

Mr. President, I close by saying, as I began, that human ingenuity can always find a way to circumvent a process. And reconciliation is a process. It has been abused terribly.

We must ask ourselves how many more people our country will be able to accommodate. We cannot be so generous that we stretch our own scarce resources to the breaking point and diminish the quality of American life for all.

America has been a traditionally generous country. We provide unrestricted visas to the immediate family members of U.S. citizens, but in developing our national immigration policies, our first consideration should be that of developing…

Our children are our future. If we shortchange our investment in them now, we will be shortchanging ourselves and our Nation in the future.

The Bulgarian expulsion of its Turkish minority is an appalling violation of the norms of civilized behavior. As such, I deplore it and I urge the administration to do so as well.

We have not yet come to realize that our economic strength is our national security and that trade is a major pillar of our economic well-being.

Our United States Treasury turns to Japan with knees trembling when we go out to sell our bonds.

I was a welder in the last war. I will not have to weld in the next one. We will not be building any ships.

This budget resolution represents progress on deficit reduction, and it demonstrates that divided government can work. I do not like divided government, but we have to take what we have. We cannot always get what we like.

We cannot dictate the future Government of Afghanistan any more than the Soviets should or, for the matter, the Pakistanis.

We have a duty to look forward and to leave the dust of the battle here. Let it settle. Let bygones be bygones and attribute to each Member the benefit of the doubt.

We must not rub salt into the wounds that have been opened. Let us act like men and women, adults, not like warring children in a sandlot football game.

The Constitution does not lay down any specific qualifications or standards for nominees. One may vote for or against a nominee on the basis of this or that or some other circumstance. He does not have to state his reasons.

The Constitution does not say that any nominee is to be given a trial period. That Constitution does not say that we Senators even have to vote on a nomination.

A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. So is our Nation strong, as long as our people flourish.

Today, in particular, the American people have been treated to inexcusable and seemingly unending abuses of the Defense procurement system. It will take hardnosed determined and sustained action to clean the system out. Credibility must be…

In these two vital benchmarks of fitness-unfailingly sound judgment under circumstances of duress and difficulty, and freedom from conflicting interests and financial pressures-Senator Tower in my judgment falls short of these thresholds.

We hear much about the power of the press, but the power of the press was not enough to beat the power of the special interests in this body.

We have lessened the influence of the special interests by enacting spending limits in Presidential campaigns. Should we not rid the people's branch of the undue influence of special interest money?

I don't want to see reform thrust upon us from the outside because of a scandal. I want us to clean up our own act.

We teach our children about achievement-about national heroes, about great men who have risen from humble beginnings because of their hard work, honesty, character, and intelligence. The lesson is, anyone can make it. The moral is shoot…

Rarely in our history has there been a more critical need for cooperation between the executive and Congress. The future of our children and grandchildren depends on us.

Let us hope that the next administration is willing to take responsibility for good management, for insisting on integrity in the procurement process, and for restoring the faith of the American taxpayer that a dollar spent on defense is…