William Whipple Quotes

Naturally our Government would not consent to such terms, and so the war had to proceed.

The brave view is that talking it out helps work it out. Maybe the realistic view is that talking it out inflames the issues further. But that is America, especially these days.

There will be a meeting of the great powers who will disagree, and the next noise we hear will be the screeching of elevators going up and down from heaven to hell.

Discussion in America means dissent.

I don't like confrontation.

There is something wonderful about turning up every day and knowing that not just the character but the whole movie kind of rests on your shoulders. And there's great satisfaction when you think it's going well and then real terror when you think it's not.

I don't like conflict.

It is pretty hard to find the right result to a controversial issue.

We've been sitting at the compromise table for a long time. We're just waiting for that cold chair to be warmed up by the Republican leadership. They still have time to do the right thing and be responsible. They just seem to be moving further and further away from it.

It's scary for me to act. It's terrifying. But I must be addicted to the adrenaline rush of the fear. It's like bungee jumping, I suppose. But after I accomplish it, I get this great sense of satisfaction and an overwhelming feeling of well being.

Battle, n., A method of untying with the teeth a political knot that would not yield to the tongue.

Here's the thing Washington always misses. Washington always wants a deal. America wants a solution. Americans sent us here to solve problems.

But just as they did in Philadelphia when they were writing the constitution, sooner or later, you've got to compromise. You've got to start making the compromises that arrive at a consensus and move the country forward.

The most important thing is that Milosevic agreed to sit at the negotiating table with the Kosovo Albanians.

The only way to deal with gridlock is compromise. And if we compromise, it means we’ll have a confused policy.

Repudiation. That’s what nations do when they don’t like agreements. They repudiate them.

It was a remarkably reasonable compromise. It pleased nobody, but everybody signed on.

It is in this area Winston, that there is likely to be some disagreement between you and me.

If the States cannot live together in harmony, under the auspices of such a Government as exists, and in the midst of blessings, such as have been the fruits of it, what is the prospect threatened by the abolition of a Common Government, with all the rivalships collisions and animosities, inseparable from such an event.

Unfortunately, many of the nations of this hemisphere are still self-tormented by domestic dissensions. Revolution succeeds revolution; injuries are committed upon foreigners engaged in lawful pursuits; much time el apses before a government sufficiently stable is erected to justify expectation of redress; ministers are sent and received, and before the discussions of past injuries are fairly begun fresh troubles arise; but too frequently new injuries are added to the old, to be discussed together with the existing government after it has proved its ability to sustain the assaults made upon it, or with its successor if overthrown. If this unhappy condition of things continues much longer, other nations will be under the painful necessity of deciding whether justice to their suffering citizens does not require a prompt redress of injuries by their own power, without waiting for the establishment of a government competent and enduring enough to discuss and to make satisfaction for them.

According to some of the goo-goo's, we ought to negotiate with every individual until he's happy.

Another reason commissions are able to produce consensus—perhaps the rarest of Washington commodities—is the simple opportunity they provide for intense private deliberations.

It typically takes bipartisan work to build enough consensus to get things through our legislative process.

What I do know from my life is the phenomenon of saying, 'This is too small a thing to argue about', but then nevertheless finding oneself in that argument.

My view on working with any government in the world is that there are things that you will agree upon and things that you will not. And you don't want to let the things you don't mean that you don't have any interface.