Great Words from Great Presidents

It’s Presidents’ Day. We spent it with grandkids. Went to a fun little rock shot to satisfy a granddaughter’s new interest in geology, went to the park, did some artwork, and some cooking.

We are living after the manner of happiness[i]—which is something we can still do in this great country.

To mark the holiday here today, I’ll share a few quotes (mostly that I think I haven’t shared before) from some favorite presidents. Just one from George Washington today (shared on Facebook today by Wallbuilders), the rest from Abraham Lincoln.

  

The world has never had a good definition of liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in need of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.

With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name—liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names—liberty and tyranny.

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty, especially as the sheep was a black one. Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty; and precisely the same difference prevails today among us human creatures, even in the North, and all professing to love liberty. Hence we behold the processes by which thousands are daily passing from under the yoke of bondage, hailed by some as the advance of liberty, and bewailed by others as the destruction of all liberty.— Abraham Lincoln, in his Address at a Sanitary Fair, Baltimore, Apr. 18, 1864

 

Abraham Lincoln

I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day. Lincoln Observed: The Civil War Dispatches of Noah Brooks, edited by Michael Burlingame (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), p. 210.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.—Abraham Lincoln

As each man has one mouth to be fed, and one pair of hands to furnish food, it was probably intended that that particular pair of hands should feed that particular mouth.—Abraham Lincoln

Responding to a question about which side God was on during the Civil War: “I am not at all concerned about that, for I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord’s side.” Abraham Lincoln’s Stories and Speeches, ed. J. B. McClure, Chicago: Rhodes and McClure Publishing Co., 1896, pp. 185–86.)

This, and this only (will satisfy the South): cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right… Holding, as they do, that slavery is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot cease to demand a full national recognition of it, as a legal right, and a social blessing…Let us be diverted by none of these sophistical contrivances…such as groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong.—Abraham Lincoln  

If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.—Abraham Lincoln

No oppressed[ii] people will fight, and endure, as our fathers did, without the promise of something better than a mere change of masters.—Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on the Constitution and Union, January 1, 1861

Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.—Abraham Lincoln, Lyceum Address

Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC

I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day. Lincoln Observed: The Civil War Dispatches of Noah Brooks edited by Michael Burlingame (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), p. 210.

We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.—Abraham Lincoln

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[i] 2 Nephi 5:27 “And it came to pas that we lived after the manner of happiness.”

[ii] The quote as I found it had a comma here, after “oppressed,” and also after “better.”  It doesn’t make sense to include these, so I have omitted them, in hopes of clarifying.

Great Words from a Great Mind

It’s President’s Day, so I thought I’d share a few favorite quotes from the greats: George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. I’ve done that in past years, however [here and here]. And, while they’re worth repeating every Presidents’ Day, with the death of Justice Antonin Scalia this past weekend, I’m changing plans and quoting him instead.

Justice Antonin Scalia
image from here

He was quotable in interviews and speeches, and maybe regular life. But many of his memorable words come from SCOTUS decisions, particular his dissents. Here are a few.

In reference to the bad decision on King v. Burwell, June 2015, which upheld the Obamacare question concerning state exchanges:

The Court holds that when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act says “Exchange established by the State” it means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government.” That is of course quite absurd, and the Court’s 21 pages of explanation make it no less so….

This case requires us to decide whether someone who buys insurance on an Exchange established by the Secretary gets tax credits. You would think the answer would be obvious—so obvious there would hardly be a need for the Supreme Court to hear a case about it. In order to receive any money under §36B, an individual must enroll in an insurance plan through an “Exchange established by the State.” The Secretary of Health and Human Services is not a State. So an Exchange established by the Secretary is not an Exchange established by the State—which means people who buy health insurance through such an Exchange get no money under §36B….

If the subsidy would be given for any exchange, then it would be odd to keep referring to the subsidy coming in relation to a state exchange under §36B. There are places in the vast law, cited by Justice Scalia, that refer to both the state exchanges and those provided by the secretary of HHS, and sometimes together those are referred to as “exchanges,” but never in relation to §36B (the subsidy, dealing with the IRS). Every time the subsidy is referred to, the full phrase includes “state exchange” and the reference to the part of the law. Not just a time or two, but I believe it was seven times. That’s not an accident; it’s clearly to delineate when such a subsidy can be given.

Here is one of the more important lines:

Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State

is “established by the State.”

There’s more:

Perhaps sensing the dismal failure of its efforts to show that “established by the State” means “established by the State or the Federal Government,” the Court tries to palm off the pertinent statutory phrase as “inartful drafting.” This Court, however, has no free-floating power “to rescue Congress from its drafting errors.”

And,

They made Congress, not this Court, responsible for

both making laws and mending them.

And this memorable line:

We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.

And this:

This Court’s two decisions on the Act will surely be remembered through the years…. And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.

Justice Scalia speaks at Roger Williams University
law school; image from here

I came across this next quote in a PJMedia piece today. It concerns a 1996 free-speech decision, which I believe was to overturn a ban on internet pornography. Scalia wrote in his dissent:

The court must be living in another world. Day by day, case by case,

it is busy designing a Constitution for a country I do not recognize.

Justice Scalia had plenty to say following the Court’s invention of a right for same-sex couples to marry each other, in his Obergefell v. Hodges dissent:

So it is not of special importance to me what the law says about marriage. It is of overwhelming importance, however, who it is that rules me. Today’s decree says that my Ruler, and the Ruler of 320 million Americans coast-to-coast, is a majority of the nine lawyers on the Supreme Court. The opinion in these cases is the furthest extension in fact—and the furthest extension one can even imagine—of the Court’s claimed power to create “liberties” that the Constitution and its Amendments neglect to mention. This practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine, always accompanied (as it is today) by extravagant praise of liberty, robs the People of the most important liberty they asserted in the Declaration of Independence and won in the Revolution of 1776: the freedom to govern themselves.

And further in:

When the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, every State limited marriage to one man and one woman, and no one doubted the constitutionality of doing so. That resolves these cases. When it comes to determining the meaning of a vague constitutional provision—such as “due process of law” or “equal protection of the laws”—it is unquestionable that the People who ratified that provision did not understand it to prohibit a practice that remained both universal and uncontroversial in the years after ratification.

Followed by:

Since there is no doubt whatever that the People never decided to prohibit the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples, the public debate over same-sex marriage must be allowed to continue. But the Court ends this debate, in an opinion lacking even a thin veneer of law. Buried beneath the mummeries and straining-to-be-memorable passages of the opinion is a candid and startling assertion: No matter what it was the People ratified, the Fourteenth Amendment protects those rights that the Judiciary, in its “reasoned judgment,” thinks the Fourteenth Amendment ought to protect.

And to put a finer point on it:

A system of government that makes the People subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy.

Justice Scalia was nominated by President Reagan in 1986. He was completing his 29^th session on the Supreme Court this year. I’ve mainly quoted from a couple of recent opinions. There should be books—and probably are or will be—documenting his opinions. And probably more books retelling his wit and wisdom. Those of us who love our country and our Constitution feel a bit bereft right now. We needed him on the Court.

Cartoon by A. F. Branco

As for replacement, the speculation is just beginning. There is plenty of precedent to avoid seating a justice in the last lame-duck year of a presidency. Replacement this far into the term—near the time when opinions are beginning to be written, and most briefs read and considered—is too late for a new justice to come up to speed. Cases resulting in a 4-4 ruling can be reheard in the next term. It is better to have the Court down a number than to have cases badly settled by an unprepared guess.

The next term begins again in the fall, just before the election. There is no hurry from either party to grant the power to name a new justice to an outgoing president, instead of the one to be sworn in in January. A new president can be ready to name a replacement immediately, allowing maximum time for serving in the coming term.

To those of us who valued Scalia’s adherence to the Constitution, it is imperative that we have a justice who reads, understands, and abides by the law, rather than wavering according to the whims of the time.

Postponing the appointment gives us reason to hope. But it depends on the Senate standing firm. Scary thought. But that is what we must pray for. That, and a next president who knows what to look for in a justice.

Words from Presidents Past

I had a middle-of-the-night brainstorm over the weekend, remembering that this Monday (today) would be Presidents’ Day—celebrated in a big way at our house with Mr. Spherical Model painting the guest bathroom. Anyway, the brainstorm was, I could just go through my rather huge quote file and share some wisdom from our presidents with February birthdays: George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

I gathered the quotes. And then I thought I should check and make sure I wasn’t doing too much repetition from my tours of Washington, D.C., last fall. And I just casually checked to see what I’d done in the past for Presidents’ Day. Turns out I've had this brainstorm before. So I have several options: be repetitious, or just decide that doing quotes from Washington and Lincoln is a new tradition for Presidents’ Day. I think I’ll go with that option. What I’ll do is include a few that were not included last year. (And who knows how the tradition will continue next year. They said a lot of wise things.)

We give thanks to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln for their wisdom, which still directs us toward freedom, prosperity, and civilization. And may I add a prayer that our next president embodies this timeless wisdom.

George Washington



in the museum at Mt. Vernon

 

It is impossible to govern a nation without God and the Bible. 

Your love of liberty, your respect for the laws, your habits of industry,

and your practice of moral and religious obligations,

are the strongest claims to national and individual happiness.

 

A good moral character is the first essential in a man….

It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous.

 

Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains taken to bring it to light.

 

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln Memorial
 

 

 

We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the Courts,

not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the menwho would pervert the Constitution.

 

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by encouraging class hatred. You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn. You cannot build character and courage by taking away man’s initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.—attributed to Abraham Lincoln, but possibly came from Rev. William John Henry Boetcker (1873-1962), in a pamphlet called “The Ten Cannots.”

 

Elections belong to the people. It’s their decision.

If they decide to turn their back on the fire and then burn their behinds,

then they will just have to sit on their blisters.

 

Nearly all men can stand adversity,

but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.