But the United States is neither a Christian nation nor the exclusive home of any particular religious group. Non-Christians are not guests. We are as much hosts as any Mayflower-descendant Protestant. It is our home as well as theirs. And in a home with so many owners, there can be no official sectarian prayer. That is what the First Amendment is all about, and the first act by the new administration was in defiance of our Constitution.

I am a peace supporting Jew.

Laws are important precisely because in a democracy they reflect the attitudes and aspirations of those they govern.

I'd require that every university, public or private, be governed by the constitutional standards regarding freedom of expression and due process. There is no reason for treating adult college students any differently in the university setting than in the outside world.

Good character consists of recognizing the selfishness that inheres in each of us and trying to balance it against the altruism to which we should all aspire. It is a difficult balance to strike, but no definition of goodness can be complete without it.

I feel like my 50 years at Harvard were an interlude. I'm really a New Yorker.

I'm not a single-issue person, but I spend so much time on Israel because it is so unfairly condemned around the world.