I want to make sure that we, as a nation, stay unified because that's how we're going to achieve our missions.

African American boys oftentimes fall behind in school early, start feeling discouraged, check out, drop out, end up on the streets and then get into trouble.

If you want to right-size executive power relative to the other branches of government, the best way to do that is to have a healthy Congress in which the two parties are debating, disagreeing, but also occasionally working together to pass legislation.

I will listen to you, especially when we disagree.

Guaranteed, full stop, nobody gets treated differently when it comes to the Justice Department, because nobody is above the law.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of our economy calls for action: bold and swift. And we will act not only to create new jobs but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its costs.

The president [Barack Obama] laid out his vision for foreign policy in a way that we hadn't heard before. And it could be summed up, I think, in two words - realistic idealism.