We must not become the new puritans and reject our society. We must address and master the future together. It can be done if we restore the belief that we share a sense of national community, that we share a common national endeavor. It can be done.
BARBARA JORDANFor our immigration policy to make sense, it is necessary to make distinctions between those who obey the law, and those who violate it.
More Barbara Jordan Quotes
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Today, I am an inquisitor. I shall not sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.
BARBARA JORDAN -
The citizens of America expect more. They deserve and they want more than a recital of problems.
BARBARA JORDAN -
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.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Throughout out history, when people have looked for new ways to solve their problems, and to uphold the principles of this nation, many times they have turned to political parties. They have often turned to the Democratic Party.
BARBARA JORDAN -
The stakes … are too high for government to be a spectator sport.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Let’s all understand that these guiding principles cannot be discarded for short-term political gains. They represent what this country is all about. They are indigenous to the American idea. And these are principles which are not negotiable.
BARBARA JORDAN -
If you had to work in the environment of Washington, D.C., as I do, and watch those men who are so imprisoned and so confined by their eighteenth-century thought patterns, you would know that if anybody is going to be liberated, it’s men who must be liberated in this country.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Let there be no illusions about the difficulty of forming this kind of a national community. It’s tough, difficult, not easy. But a spirit of harmony will survive in America only if each of us remembers that we share a common destiny.
BARBARA JORDAN -
There is no executive order; there is no law that can require the American people to form a national community. This we must do as individuals and if we do it as individuals, there is no President of the United States who can veto that decision.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Things which matter cost money, and we’ve got to spend the money if we do not want to have generations of parasites rather than generations of productive citizens.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Even as I stand here and admit that we have made mistakes I still believe that as the people of America sit in judgment on each party, they will recognize that our mistakes were mistakes of the heart. They’ll recognize that.
BARBARA JORDAN -
It is reason, and not passion, which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision.
BARBARA JORDAN -
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.
BARBARA JORDAN -
Do not call for black power or green power. Call for brain power.
BARBARA JORDAN -
The majority of the American people still believe that every single individual in this country is entitled to just as much respect, just as much dignity, as every other individual.
BARBARA JORDAN






