We have to preserve it and use it sustainably. And the short-term use of resources at the destruction of the long-term heritage of this country is not a policy that we can pursue.

I think of Martin Luther King phrase a lot when I'm deciding public issues. He said: "Here I stand: I can do no other." It is basically an affirmation of my ultimate responsibility to obey my conscience in my acts as a public official.

It is like living in a wilderness of mirrors. No fact goes unchallenged.

I have no question that the Roman Catholic Church teaches that abortion in virtually all circumstances is wrong. I think the church's position at all times in modern history has been that it is unequivocally opposed to abortion.But that's not the question for a Catholic who is a public official. I happen to subscribe to the church's position as a person. Still the question, as Governor Mario Cuomo suggested, is: what is your obligation as a civic leader? I agree entirely with John F. Kennedy. I answer only to my conscience in my public life and that's that.

Well, what I tried to do is simply to get out on the land. And when I came to Washington, I think one of the mistakes we made early on was kind of having an ideological dispute up in the Congress.

Taxes are the flip side of expenditures. The same issues apply on both sides. There are questions of fairness and justice as much in the way you take money away as in the way you disburse it.

We have an obligation to live in harmony with creation, with our capital... with God's creation. And we need to administer and work that very carefully.