PARTISANSHIP QUOTES
quotations about partisanship
There is always the danger that those who think alike should gravitate together into 'coteries' where they will henceforth encounter opposition only in the emasculated form of rumor that the outsiders say thus and thus. The absent are easily refuted, complacent dogmatism thrives, and differences of opinion are embittered by group hostility. Each group hears not the best, but the worst, that the other groups can say.
C. S. LEWIS
God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics
Partisanship brings harsh feelings for fellow Americans, it sees fellow citizens as enemies, rather than neighbors. Partisanship brings government inaction or gridlock. Partisanship does not allow good policy to take shape and move through the system to benefit the people. Partisanship hates compromise, a concept that gives birth to sound policy and actions in both government and private life. Partisanship breaks us down rather than builds us up.
JEREMY MCBAIN
"The dangers of partisanship", Petoskey News-Review, February 23, 2016
Trust that justice will be done in our courts without prejudice or partisanship is what, in a large part, distinguishes this country from others.
MERRICK GARLAND
Remarks by Judge Garland upon nomination to Supreme Court of the United States, March 18, 2016
Much indeed to be regretted, party disputes are now carried to such a length, and truth is so enveloped in mist and false representation, that it is extremely difficult to know through what channel to seek it. This difficulty to one, who is of no party, and whose sole wish is to pursue with undeviating steps a path which would lead this country to respectability, wealth, and happiness, is exceedingly to be lamented. But such, for wise purposes, it is presumed, is the turbulence of human passions in party disputes, when victory more than truth is the palm contended for.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
letter to Timothy Pickering, July 27, 1795
Partisanship leads to poor candidates for office, poor candidates in office and sometimes, dangerous candidates in office -- candidates that use partisanship to their advantage by playing to their partisan base with the right words, can do destructive things using that tactic.
JEREMY MCBAIN
"The dangers of partisanship", Petoskey News-Review, February 23, 2016
Partisanship is evidence of political memory. None of us--including our elected leaders--can handle the massive amounts of data associated with all the political issues of the day. Instead, we rely on those around us who have wisdom in particular areas to inform us of the issues. And those around us, in turn, rely on experts who have done such work before them, building upon and modifying the wisdom of the past to fit it to our current context. And this, in a nutshell, is what political parties are: repositories of political memory.
MARK DOUGLAS
Believing Aloud: Reflections on Being Religious in the Public Square
A party spirit betrays the greatest men to act as meanly as the vulgar herd.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Mankind", Les Caractères
Every partisan claims to be "on the side of the angels." Independents do too. Neither is justified, but at least partisans have their feet on the ground.
NANCY L. ROSENBLUM
On the Side of the Angels: An Appreciation of Parties and Partisanship
What politics needs is not less partisanship, but better partisanship.
RUSSELL MUIRHEAD
The Promise of Party in a Polarized Age
It's not that partisanship is intrinsically evil; in Britain it's fine.... But in America, partisanship is a problem because the government can't govern.
CHRISTINE BARBOUR & GERALD C. WRIGHT
Keeping the Republic: Power and Citizenship in American Politics
Partisanship, however, ebbs and flows over the course of decades, and this is hardly Washington's most partisan time -- not by a long shot. Nor must partisanship mean governmental paralysis. A look back at the very bitter yet historically productive late 1940s, for instance, can reassure us that all is not lost.
LAWRENCE J. HAAS
"Partisanship alone is nothing to fear", myCentralJersey, March 12, 2016
High partisanship is oriented to convictions, principles, and conceptions of the common interest. Low partisanship is about strategy, power, and ultimately, victory. The two are intimately connected, but they have different roles. Low partisanship has its place in compaigns, elections, and legislatures. But even there it can corrode cooperation and trust. High partisanship by contrast does not necessarily corrupt. The task for institutions like the executive or the judiciary is not to insulate them from all partisanship, as if political decisions could be made according to a handy nonpartisan algorithm. On the contrary, high partisanship is the link that connects these institutions with public purposes that people might endorse.
RUSSELL MUIRHEAD
The Promise of Party in a Polarized Age
The man who knows only half of any question is worse off than the man who knows nothing of it. He is not only one sided, but his partisanship soon turns him into an intolerant and a fanatic.
JAMES E. TALMAGE
The Pittsburgh Conference on Mormonism
Partisanship is our great curse. We too readily assume that everything has two sides and that it is our duty to be on one or the other. We must be defending or attacking something; only the lily-livered hide their natural cowardice by asking the impudent question: What is it all about?
JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON
The Mind in the Making: The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform
Partisanship and policymaking are not incompatible. Our parties have always fought fiercely, and often viciously, even at moments of dire challenge at home and abroad. But that hasn't prevented our relentless progress for more than two centuries -- economic growth, expanded civil rights, victory in world war, and rise to global leadership.
LAWRENCE J. HAAS
"Partisanship alone is nothing to fear", myCentralJersey, March 12, 2016
You should have disagreements with your leaders and your colleagues, but if it becomes immediately a question of questioning people's motives, and if immediately you decide that somebody who sees a whole new situation differently than you must be a bad person and somehow twisted inside, we are not going to get very far in forming a more perfect union.
BILL CLINTON
statement, May 21, 2004
There are a few things which are found to have a worse influence upon the character than to embark in partisan politics.
G. W. BURNAP
attributed, Day's Collacon
For too long, our controversies seem to boil down to conservatives and liberals (or, if you prefer, traditionalists and progressives) talking past each other for the benefit of stirring up their loyalists, as partisans do in the primary campaigns of electoral politics. The rest of us are expected to line up with our team just as soon as they show their colors.
KEN WILSON
A Letter to My Congregation
Bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.
RICHARD LUGER
attributed, "A Call for Bipartisanship", Huffington Post, October 2, 2012
Of course, partisans support parties, but the reverse is of interest, too -- parties are carriers of partisanship.
NANCY L. ROSENBLUM
On the Side of the Angels: An Appreciation of Parties and Partisanship