The arts are not a frill. The arts are a response to our individuality and our nature, and help to shape our identity. What is there that can transcend deep difference and stubborn divisions? The arts. They have a wonderful universality. Art has the potential to unify. It can speak in many languages without a translator. The arts do not discriminate. The arts lift us up.
Barbara JordanThere is no obstacle in the path of young people who are poor or members of minority groups that hard work and preparation cannot cure.
Barbara JordanWe cannot improve on the system of government handed down to us by the founders of the Republic. There is no way to improve upon that. But what we can do is to find new ways to implement that system and realize our destiny.
Barbara JordanI spent my entire career trying to protect the Constitution, the civil rights and the civil liberties of American citizens and people who are here lawfully. I, as chair of this commission, would not be a party to any system that I felt was an unpardonable intrusion into the private lives of people. If I felt that what we are recommending would be such an intrusion I can assure you that recommendation would never have seen the light of day, not even as a pilot program.
Barbara JordanWe want to be in control of our lives. Whether we are jungle fighters, craftsmen, company men, gamesmen, we want to be in control. And when the government erodes that control, we are not comfortable.
Barbara JordanLet's all understand that these guiding principles cannot be discarded for short-term political gains. They represent what this country is all about. They are indigenous to the American idea. And these are principles which are not negotiable.
Barbara JordanI do not bring any professional knowledge of the issue to bear, but what I do bring to my consideration of immigration is a deepened and highly sensitized feeling with those persons who feel alien in our country. I can feel the strangeness they feel because it is something I have experienced in a different area.
Barbara JordanFairness is an across-the-board requirement for all our interactions with each other ...Fairness treats everbody the same.
Barbara JordanWe are a people in a quandary about the present. We are a people in search of our future. We are a people in search of a national community.
Barbara JordanWe call ourselves public servants but I'll tell you this: we as public servants must set an example for the rest of the nation. It is hypocritical for the public official to admonish and exhort the people to uphold the common good.
Barbara JordanLet us heed the voice of the people and recognize their common sense. If we do not, we not only blaspheme our political heritage, we ignore the common ties that bind all Americans.
Barbara JordanJust remember the world is not a playground but a schoolroom. Life is not a holiday but an education. One eternal lesson for us all: to teach us how better we should love.
Barbara JordanToday, I am an inquisitor. I shall not sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.
Barbara JordanA spirit of harmony can only survive if each of us remembers, when bitterness and self-interest seem to prevail, that we share a common destiny.
Barbara JordanI believe that women have a capacity for understanding and compassion which a man structurally does not have, does not have it because he cannot have it. He's just incapable of it.
Barbara JordanLet there be no illusions about the difficulty of forming this kind of a national community. It's tough, difficult, not easy. But a spirit of harmony will survive in America only if each of us remembers that we share a common destiny.
Barbara JordanHow do we create a harmonious society out of so many kinds of people? The key is tolerance -- the one value that is indispensable in creating community.
Barbara JordanWe have a positive vision of the future founded on the belief that the gap between the promise and reality of America can one day be finally closed. We believe that.
Barbara JordanThe Commission endorses prevention as the principal strategy to use in deterring illegal entries. We applaud the efforts of innovative Border Patrol leaders such as Silvestre Reyes with Operation Hold the Line in El Paso. Operation Hold the Line demonstrated that a strategic use of personnel and technology can combine at our land border, as it has for many years at our airports, to reduce unauthorized crossings.
Barbara JordanMy faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total, and I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminuation, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution. It is reason and not passion which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision.
Barbara JordanA government is invigorated when each of us is willing to participate in shaping the future of this nation.
Barbara JordanThere is no executive order; there is no law that can require the American people to form a national community. This we must do as individuals and if we do it as individuals, there is no President of the United States who can veto that decision.
Barbara JordanWe are a party of innovation. We do not reject our traditions, but we are willing to adapt to changing circumstances, when change we must. We are willing to suffer the discomfort of change in order to achieve a better future.
Barbara JordanWe believe that the people are the source of all governmental power; that the authority of the people is to be extended, not restricted.
Barbara JordanIf the society today allows wrongs to go unchallenged, the impression is created that those wrongs have the approval of the majority.
Barbara JordanEven as I stand here and admit that we have made mistakes I still believe that as the people of America sit in judgment on each party, they will recognize that our mistakes were mistakes of the heart. They'll recognize that.
Barbara JordanThe Supreme Court has always been the last bastion of the protection of our freedoms.
Barbara JordanWe, as human beings, must be willing to accept people who are different from ourselves.
Barbara JordanIf you are dissatisfied with they way things are, then you have got to resolve to change them.
Barbara JordanAmericanization means the process of becoming an American. It means civic incorporation, becoming a part of the polity - becoming one of us. But that does not mean conformity. We are more than a melting pot, we are a kaleidoscope, where every turn of history refracts new light on the old promise.
Barbara JordanWe must not become the new puritans and reject our society. We must address and master the future together. It can be done if we restore the belief that we share a sense of national community, that we share a common national endeavor. It can be done.
Barbara JordanIf you had to work in the environment of Washington, D.C., as I do, and watch those men who are so imprisoned and so confined by their eighteenth-century thought patterns, you would know that if anybody is going to be liberated, it's men who must be liberated in this country.
Barbara Jordan"We, the people." It is a very elegant beginning. But when that document was completed on the 17th of September in 1787, I was not included in that "We, the people."
Barbara JordanIf we promise as public officials, we must deliver. If we as public officials propose, we must produce.
Barbara JordanI have faith in young people because I know the strongest emotions which prevail are those of love and caring and belief and tolerance.
Barbara JordanThe Commission agrees that the federal government should help alleviate these costs. The best way to do so is to reduce illegal immigration.... We recommend immediate reimbursement of criminal justice costs, because these conditions can now be met, but we urge further study of the costs of health care and education before impact aid is provided.
Barbara JordanWe can certainly defuse the intensity of the anti-immigrant feeling if we can bring some reality to the discussion by showing that they are not using that many resources.
Barbara JordanLet each person do his or her part. If one citizen is unwilling to participate, all of us are going to suffer. For the American idea, though it is shared by all of us, is realized in each one of us.
Barbara JordanWe must exchange the philosophy of excuse - what I am is beyond my control for the philosophy of responsibility.
Barbara Jordan