Mack McLarty Quotes
We have been with democracy for over 200 years and from time to time we find that we have not perfected it.
Mack McLarty, White House Chief of Staff (Democrat), Special Envoy for the Americas, Speech, National Press Club, April 9, 1998
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The University Presidents had written to the American Public arguing that the German aggression was the result of the militarists in the German society dominating the people and pushing them to war. They argued that most German people were not really responsible. Lamprecht took exception and argued that the German policy was the democratic will of the majority of the German people. He claimed that Germany at the time was more of a de facto democracy than America—as the Untied States did not have a Voting Rights Act or any way of de facto ensuring that all citizens could vote—particularly Negroes in the South. While he was accurate about the voting aspects of a democracy, Germany neither had the Constitution nor a judiciary that was independent and co-equal to the executive and legislature, but Germany did not have the institutions with democratic traditions. The greatest embarrassment to modern Germans is that Adolf Hitler was actually elected by a majority of Germans and was very popular until things in Germany started to go poorly. This quotation is very important in that it shows the importance of a Constitution to limit the powers of even a popularly elected government.
Thomas F. "Mack" McLarty, III is an American business and political leader who served as President Bill Clinton's first White House Chief of Staff from 1993 to June 1994, and subsequently as Counselor to the President and Special Envoy for the Americas, before leaving government service in June 1998.
