Representative Accountability Quotes

I think the American people deserve to have the issues debated, regardless of which side they're on, so that they are fully aware of what their representatives and senators are voting for and voting against.

Their ideas may contradict the sense of the whole people; hence the consequence that instructions are binding on the representative is of a doubtful, if not a dangerous nature.

The people can never err more than in supporting that by multiplying their representatives beyond a certain limit, they strengthen the barrier against the government of a few.

Now these fellows in Washington wouldn't be so serious and particular if they only had to vote on what they thought was good for the majority of the people in the U.S. That would be a cinch. But what makes it hard for them is every time a bill comes up they have things to decide that have nothing to do with the merit of the bill. The principal thing is of course: What will this do for me personally back home?

The people can never err more in supposing that by multiplying their representatives beyond a certain limit they strengthen the barrier against the government of a few.

And I am saying, how about the other two branches? And putting the pressure on our representatives in the Senate and the Congress, and the court system. They should be counter-acting this corruption, but they are sitting there silent.

Term limits mean that you don't trust the voters. 'Stop me before I vote again.'

We demand that the House of Representatives shall again become a deliberative body, controlled by the majority of the people's Representatives and not be the Speaker ...

We get what we deserve if we allow our policy-making representatives vote on laws they haven’t read and don’t fully understand.

Speaker Boehner has said many times that the House of Representatives is the closest institution to the people, and he recognizes that by empowering the members to have direct input into the process.

So I think it's important to understand that your duly elected representatives have been consistently informed about exactly what we're doing.

If everybody in our caucus had a 50/50 [Democrat/Republican] district, we'd have a lot different discussion. But if they have a 90 percent Democratic district, they don't ever talk to a Republican, they don't have to and they don't want to.

Quite apart from the problem of the vote, it's bad for the image of Parliament that people take the trouble to come up and are not allowed to see their MP.

Frequent return to the bar of their Constituents is the strongest check against the corruptions to which men are liable, either from the intrigues of others of more subtle genius, or the propensities of their own hearts…

Poor quality of representatives... is not a purely Australian phenomenon - it's a worldwide phenomenon.

Voters should know what their representative is doing, what votes he casts, and who he pays, so my office will make this data readily available in a way which is easy to understand.

What I try to do is tell my constituents that this is what I believe and this is why I made that vote. And I think that that makes more sense to people generally than trying to triangulate some political position.

It ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention.