Barbara Jordan quotes | Thousands Of Quotes

Search for quotes

Do not call for black power or green power. Call for brain power.

But this is the great danger America faces. That we will cease to be one nation and become instead a collection of interest groups: city against suburb, region against region, individual against individual. Each seeking to satisfy private wants.

A nation is formed by the willingness of each of us to share in the responsibility for upholding the common good.

Barbara Jordan

Nation

Responsibility

Life is too large to hang out a sign: "For Men Only."

Barbara Jordan

Life

Men

We have made mistakes. In our haste to do all things for all people, we did not foresee the full consequences of our actions. And when the people raised their voices, we didn't hear. But our deafness was only a temporary condition, and not an irreversible condition.

In other times, I could stand here and give this kind of exposition on the beliefs of the Democratic Party and that would be enough. But today that is not enough. People want more.

More is required of public officials than slogans and handshakes and press releases. More is required. We must hold ourselves strictly accountable. We must provide the people with a vision of the future.

What we have to do is strike a balance between the idea that government should do everything and the idea, the belief, that government ought to do nothing. Strike a balance.

What the people want is very simple - they want an America as good as its promise.

We must exchange the philosophy of excuse - what I am is beyond my control for the philosophy of responsibility.

We have a positive vision of the future founded on the belief that the gap between the promise and reality of America can one day be finally closed. We believe that.

We cannot improve on the system of government handed down to us by the founders of the Republic. There is no way to improve upon that. But what we can do is to find new ways to implement that system and realize our destiny.

Barbara Jordan

Government

Destiny

We call ourselves public servants but I'll tell you this: we as public servants must set an example for the rest of the nation. It is hypocritical for the public official to admonish and exhort the people to uphold the common good.

We are a people trying not only to solve the problems of the present: unemployment, inflation... but we are attempting on a larger scale to fulfill the promise of America.

We are a people in a quandary about the present. We are a people in search of our future. We are a people in search of a national community.

Barbara Jordan

People

Community