Janet Reno Quotes

If you're in government, the right thing to do is be focused on solving real problems and asking what's the best solution to a particular problem.

My task as a citizen is to get the government to do more good and less inefficient and wasteful work.

I am committed to working towards a more transparent, accountable, and ethical federal government worthy of the public's trust.

Today we must make a pact with each other to end this reckless conduct with the people's government.

In my roles as Deputy State Treasurer and Special Assistant Attorney General, I strove to make government more responsive, transparent, efficient, and proactive.

A government for the people must depend for its success on the intelligence, the morality, the justice, and the interest of the people themselves.

I want to make sure we are presenting to the South Australian people a Government that is open and accountable. I want to make sure that we maintain public confidence in government at all levels.

If the government is determined to reject what we have accepted, then do not ask us to do it…since the supreme interests of the country are above personal considerations, the national government can act according to its conviction. We expect no thanks from the government. The nation and history will be our judge.

I want to lead a government humble enough to know its place.

Democracy is not something you believe in or a place to hang your hat, but it's something you do. You participate. If you stop doing it, democracy crumbles.

It has been my philosophy all my life that good government is good politics.

The more responsibility you can move toward local government, the better of you're going to be … City governments do better than their State governments in terms of accountability.

All persons who take part in government are accountable for their actions.

Our object today should be not to weaken government in competition with other centers of power, but rather to strengthen it as the agency charged with responsibility for the common good. That government is best which governs best.

Choose the manager of your government as you would the manager of your private business.

The policy of the public authorities of never taking an initiative, and always waiting to be urged to do their duty, is fatal in a ward where there is no initiative among the citizens.

To speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

Our most dangerous tendency is to expect too much of government, and at the same time do for it too little.

On Capitol Hill we like to make tough speeches. We don’t like to make tough choices.

Political authorities should lead the way and not lag behind [public opinion].

My position is to listen to my constituents, learn from the best information available and ultimately make sound, rational decisions that are going to be beneficial to the people…

The government being the people’s business, it necessarily follows that its operations should be at all times open to public view.

Americans want the building to continue. They expect and deserve a government that will allow that to happen.

Elected officials should be held to a higher standard, and we cannot enable misbehavior with a system that secretly settles with public funds.

I do think there are some irreducible inefficiencies in government. But we still need to have government; we still need to make government effective if we can.