Legislate Quotes & Sayings

Obviously, the state's responsibility should be to legislate rules for a well-ordered society. It has no right or duty to creep into the bedrooms of the nation. — Pierre Trudeau

You can legislate many conditions-but you cannot legislate harmony into the hearts of men. To attain industrial peace, we need more than by-laws and compulsory rules. — Clarence Francis

It's hard to legislate what people eat. People are getting fed up with being told what they can and can't do. It boils down to personal responsibility. People need to read labels, do their research and act accordingly. — Tom Douglas

The Obama administration is on notice - they will not be allowed to regulate what they have been unable to legislate. — Fred Upton

We can't legislate human nature. — Taya Kyle

With true free speech has to come an understanding of when and when not to use it. But you can't legislate that. It must be voluntary - especially in a world where a whisper can reach a million people in an eye blink. — Nick Harkaway

Modern Democrats aren't the first political party to abuse power - far from it. Obama isn'€t the first president to abuse executive power - not by a longshot. But he has to be the first president in American history to overtly and consistently argue that he's empowered to legislate if Congress doesn'€t pass the laws he favors. It's an argument that's been mainstreamed by partisans and cheered on by those in media desperate to find a morsel of triumph in this presidency. — David Harsanyi

We legislate against forestalling and monopoly; we would have a common granary for the poor; but the selfishness which hoards thecorn for high prices, is the preventative of famine; and the law of self-preservation is surer policy than any legislation can be. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

We cannot legislate equality but we can legislate ... equal opportunity for all. — Helen Gahagan Douglas

Quote of the Day The late Dr. Adrian Rogers (1931-2005) offered the following observation several years ago and it bears poignant significance today: You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the rich out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply the wealth by dividing it. — Adrian Rogers

Government has three primary functions. It should provide for military defense of the nation. It should enforce contracts between individuals. It should protect citizens from crimes against themselves or their property. When government
in pursuit of good intentions tries to rearrange the economy, legislate morality, or help special interests, the cost come in inefficiency, lack of motivation, and loss of freedom. Government should be a referee, not an active player. — Milton Friedman

They can say that abortion is alright. They can vote to sustain gay marriage. And that will take western civilization, indeed other nations because people look to our country as one nation as under God and whenever we legislate sin and we say abortion is permissible and we say gay unions are permissible, then average citizens who are not Christians, because they don't know better, we are leading them astray and it's wrong. — Katherine Harris

The other General Welfare Clause is in the first of the authorities given to the Congress and it's not a grant, it's a restriction. By which I mean it doesn't say Congress can legislate for the general welfare, it means that everything Congress must do has to enhance the general welfare of the United States of America. It can't grant things to individuals, it can only legislate for the government. — Andrew Napolitano

Friend, you cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. And what one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government can't give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody. And when half of the people get the idea they don't have to work because the other half's going to take care of them, and when the other half get the idea it does no good to work because somebody's going to get what I work for. That, dear friend, is about the end of any nation. — Adrian Rogers

Too many people in America believe that if you are pro-choice that means pro-abortion. It doesn't. I don't want abortion. Abortion should be the rarest thing in the world. I am actually personally opposed to abortion. But I don't believe that I have a right to take what is an article of faith to me and legislate it to other people. That's not how it works in America. — John F. Kerry

It is our job, as members of parliament, to legislate with an eye to the long term future, to look over the horizon beyond the next election and ensure that as far as we can what we do today will make Australia a better place, a safer place, for future generations to live in. — Malcolm Turnbull

I think all we should legislate is morality. — John Ashcroft

Dr. King once said, "You cannot legislate goodness, and you cannot pass a law to force someone to respect you. The only way to social justice, in a capitalist country, is through economic parity." — John Hope Bryant

Social equity is based on justice; politics change on the opinion of the time. The black man's skin will be a mark of social inferiority so long as white men are conceited, ignorant, unjust, and prejudiced. You cannot legislate these qualities out of the white - you must steal them out by teaching, illustration, and example. — John Boyle O'Reilly

I can't legislate to change human nature. — John Major

He's a lovely guy, but there's no spark between us whatsoever. It just goes to show, that even with all their fancy assessment tools, the government can't legislate for chemistry. — Siobhan Davis

One cannot legislate the maniacs off the street ... these maniacs can only be shut down by an armed citizenry. Indeed bad things can happen in nations where the citizenry is armed, but not as bad as those which seem to be threatening our disarmed citizenry in this country at this time. — Jeff Cooper

The business of the state trying to legislate modesty is relatively both an infantile and ridiculous procedure. Of course, it is true that the more things are secreted the more intriguing they become, because it is always the forbidden that has the strongest appeal. Nudity is a state of fact - lewdity a state of mind. — Paul Outerbridge

When I direct my own scripts, it's much easier as it's been in my head for a year already. What I love about this is having an idea and seeing it come to fruition onscreen. I would like to direct someone else's script one day, but I might not get round to it before I die - you can't legislate for being hit by a bus! — Ricky Gervais

There is very little truth in the old refrain that one cannot legislate equality. Laws not only provide concrete benefits, they can even change the hearts of men - some men, anyhow - for good or evil. — Gilbert King

In so far as it is an institution intended to achieve, for the benefit of the greatest number, the social reforms to which landed suffrage is opposed, universal suffrage is powerless; especially if it pretends to legislate or govern directly. For, until the social reforms are accomplished, the greatest number is of necessity the least enlightened, and consequently the least capable of understanding and effecting reforms. In regard to the antinomy, pointed out by him, of liberty and government, - whether the latter be monarchic, aristocratic, or democratic in form. — Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

If the president uses executive orders to legislate new laws, that would be an example of him subverting legislative power from Congress, and might be considered a gross perversion of the Constitution. — Gary Hansen

Almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so. — Robert A. Heinlein

As the elephant is powerless to think in the terms of the ant, in spite of the best intentions in the world, even so is the Englishman powerless to think in the terms of, or legislate for, the Indian. — Mahatma Gandhi

I'm into it, I'm into MP3's; I think there's no way you're ever going to be able to legislate people having to buy a record in order to listen to it. You have to look at it as a means of promotion, and if the music is good enough, promotion is a good thing. — Britt Daniel

You don't get to legislate the parameters of my confidence. I get to feel good about myself because I am a person; my size has nothing to do with it. IN — Brittany Gibbons

But our hope does not lie in enforcing our ethic upon secular governments. We can't legislate the kingdom of God into existence. — Preston Sprinkle

When I have not rage or sorrow, and you depart from me, then I am most afraid. When the belly is full, and the mind has its sayings, then I fear for my soul; I rush to you as a child at night breaks into its parents' room. Do not forget me in my satisfaction. When the heart grins at itself, the world is destroyed. And I am found alone with the husks and the shells. Then the dangerous moment comes: I am too great to ask for help. I have other hopes. I legislate from the fortress of my disappointments, with a set jaw. Overthrow this even terror with a sweet remembrance: when I was with you, when my soul delighted you, when I was what you wanted. My heart sings of your longing for me, and my thoughts climb down to marvel at your mercy. I do not fear as you gather up my days. Your name is the sweetness of time, and you carry me close into the night, speaking consolations, drawing down lights from the sky, saying, See how the night has no terror for one who remembers the Name. — Leonard Cohen

It pains me deeply to see members of my own party attempting to legislate women's health and contraception choices. — Linda Lingle

I am a traditionalist, and I'm an innovator. Most of what I do is to weigh change and legislate to the best of my ability on what should change and what should not. Do I have a respect for tradition? Of course I do. Do I have a blind belief in it? No. — Judith Martin

You can't legislate morality. — Jesse Ventura

In fact, it is often times a detriment for the Government to preemptively legislate on an issue before we can either define it or grasp its impact. — Steve Buyer

You can't really legislate for the decisions that your heart makes. — Tom Hiddleston

You can't legislate or litigate good, healthy behavior but we must be willing to educate people at an early age about the affects of unhealthy living. — Zack Wamp

Political correctness does not legislate tolerance; it only organizes hatred. — Jacques Barzun

You can't legislate into existence an act of forgiveness and a true confession; those are mysteries of the human heart, and they occur between one individual and another individual, not a panel of judges sitting asking questions, trying to test your truth. — Athol Fugard

But the law is made, generally, by one man, or by one class of men. And as law cannot exist without the sanction and the support of a preponderating force, it must finally place this force in the hands of those who legislate. This — Frederic Bastiat

It is no surprise that the Republican-controlled Senate intelligence committee has once again caved in to the wishes of the White House and refused even to open an investigation. We cannot effectively legislate on the NSA spying issue if we do not know the facts, and we will not know them if the Republican-controlled intelligence committee persists in refusing to do its job. — Harry Reid

I would do a Byrds tour or a Byrds record in a minute. I miss that band now. I've tried to convince Roger over and over to do it, but he's not interested. Music isn't something you can legislate into being. — David Crosby

Of course, you can't legislate for how people are going to read. — Paul Muldoon

You can't legislate against stupidity. — Jesse Ventura

Everybody in the GE used secondaries. It was part of the culture now; socially acceptable. There had been many attempts by the Brussels parliament to legislate against it, and the Tax Bureau certainly did its best. But of course, if a method had been found to clear up people's finances and put them on a hundred per cent legitimate, transparent basis, it would have worked for everyone, politicians and tax officials included. — Peter F. Hamilton

I think Chairman Davis has said he would always prefer that baseball strengthens its own policies and not leave it to Congress to legislate. In the absence of any action, he believes Congress is ready to move forward. — Robert J. White

We do it all the time, we legislate taste. We do it with the tax code. Churches and children get a tax break, because it's assumed that we all agree that we want to encourage churches and children. I don't. I don't. That's my opinion. I don't want to encourage either churches or children, and it's a very bad idea to put them together. — Bill Maher

Those who would legislate against the teaching of evolution should also legislate against gravity, electricity and the unreasonable velocity of light, and also should introduce a clause to prevent the use of the telescope, the microscope and the spectroscope or any other instrument of precision which may in the future be invented, constructed or used for the discovery of truth. — Luther Burbank

Though it's impossible for us to legislate one's thoughts and feelings, we still need things like affirmative action in place because without measures like it, people in charge would not have, sadly, enough impetus to do, as cliched as it sounds, the right thing. — Jonathan Coleman

You can't legislate stupidity. — Jesse Ventura

Gay people are born everyday. You will never legislate that away. — Melissa Etheridge

You cannot legislate an attitude. — H. Rap Brown

Countries legislate out creativity. — Dennis Roberts

Congress has the power to legislate with regard to activity that, in the aggregate, has a substantial effect on interstate commerce. — David Souter

A big tent is great and all, but there has to be a line in the sand, and I'm pretty sure the desire to legislate other women's bodies is it. — Andi Zeisler

There is a desperate tendency to try to legislate artists, to try to lay down rules for their obligations to society. Just leave artists alone. If you are a true artist, you will have a very finely tuned moral mechanism. — Athol Fugard

If there be any plausible reason for supposing that we have the right to legislate on the slave interests of the District, you cannot put down the investigation of the subject out of doors, by refusing to receive petitions. — Caleb Cushing

We should be supportive of the president and supportive of rights of all in a pluralistic democracy that we're called to love. And we live our faith; we don't legislate our faith. — Otis Moss III

The obligation of human beings to support and obey human governments, while they legislate upon the principles of the moral law, is an unalterable as the moral law itself. — Charles Grandison Finney

The best man, then, must legislate, and laws must be passed, but these laws will have no authority when they miss the mark, though in all other cases retaining their authority. But when the law cannot determine a point at all, or not well, should the one best man or should all decide? According to our present practice assemblies meet, sit in judgment, deliberate, and decide, and their judgments an relate to individual cases. Now any member of the assembly, taken separately, is certainly inferior to the wise man. But the state is made up of many individuals. And as a feast to which all the guests contribute is better than a banquet furnished by a single man, so a multitude is a better judge of many things than any individual. — Aristotle.

I can't legislate a song into being; it just will not happen for me. — David Crosby

Most of the Mardukans were laughing, now. Some of them were accusing him of being just too utterly ridiculous.

"Why, the people are the Government. The people would not legislate themselves into slavery."

He wished Otto Harkaman were there. All he knew of history was the little he had gotten from reading some of Harkaman's books, and the long, rambling conversations aboard ship in hyperspace or in the evenings at Rivington. But Harkaman, he was sure, could have furnished hundreds of instances, on scores of planets and over ten centuries of time, in which people had done exactly that and hadn't known what they were doing, even after it was too late. — H. Beam Piper

By declaring our Prophet infallible and not permitting ourselves to question him, we Muslims had set up a static tyranny. The Prophet Muhammad attempted to legislate every aspect of life. By adhering to his rules of what is permitted and what is forbidden, we Muslims supressed the freedom to think for ourselves and to act as we chose. We froze the moral outlook of billions of people into the mind-set of the Arab desert in the seventh century. We were not just servants of Allah, we were slaves. — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

We don't legislate emergent technologies into existence. We almost never do. They just emerge, dragged forth by Adam Smith's invisible hand. Then we have to see what people are actually going to do with them, and try to legislate to take account of that. — William Gibson

Personally, I am far from convinced that the British system is suited to India. The parliamentary democracy we have adopted involves the British perversity of electing a legislature to form an executive: this has created a unique breed of legislator, largely unqualified to legislate, who has sought election only in order to wield (or influence) executive power. It has produced governments obliged to focus more on politics than on policy or performance. It has distorted the voting preferences of an electorate that knows which individuals it wants but not necessarily which policies. It has spawned parties that are shifting alliances of individual interests rather than the vehicles of coherent sets of ideas. It has forced governments to concentrate less on governing than on staying in office, and obliged them to cater to the lowest common denominator of their coalitions. It is time for a change. Pluralist — Shashi Tharoor

It's a hard thing to legislate. You can't legislate good taste and you can't put a number on it in terms of square footage. It's a question of where individual rights end and community rights begin. — Ann Robinson

Taste cannot be controlled by law. We must resist at all costs any attempt to regulate our individual freedoms and to legislate our personal moralities. — Thomas Jefferson

Society has to be structured such that there are checks and balances, so that it can't be manipulated, for instance, for the profit of just some multinational company who's going to get rich on trying to legislate the environment. — Greg Graffin

I can't take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an Atheist. We have separation of church and state in the United States of America. — John F. Kerry

Whatever adults don't understand, because they didn't grow up with it, is the thing they're going to be afraid of and try to legislate out of existence. It happened with videogames, it happened with television, it happened with pinball parlours and rock and roll. — Warren Spector

I'm a little skeptical about using the Constitution this way, but I also believe marriage is between a man and a woman and that the courts shouldn't legislate this matter. — Pete Coors

You cannot legislate language. Prohibition never worked, right? Not for booze and not for sex and not for words. — Mary Norris

People are under the impression that dictionaries legislate language. What a dictionary does is keep track of usages over time. — Steven Pinker

I, sir, take a different view of the whole matter. I look upon Ohio and South Carolina to be parts of one whole - parts of the same country - and that country is my country. ... I come here not to consider that I will do this for one distinct part of it, and that for another, but ... to legislate for the whole. And finally Webster turned to a higher idea: the idea - in and of itself - of Union, permanent and enduring. — Robert A. Caro

Now we Democrats, well, we're all for higher taxes, right? But man do we hate to pay those taxes, and most of the politicians I worked for took advantage of every tax loophole they could find, and if they couldn't find it, they'd just legislate one out of thin air. That's the D.C. way. Tax policy is a means to buy votes, but at the end of the day, we all share in a mutual disdain for government. It's — D.W. Ulsterman

I am proud to stand with the millions of women and men who recognize that our government should legislate according to the reality of our lives - not for ideology. — Sandra Fluke

We certainly ... hope that the Congress will act in an appropriate fashion and not waste its time with ineffectual, sham legislation on Keystone XL that has no impact on the price of gas and is irresponsible because it, as we've said before, tries to legislate the approval of a pipeline for which there is not even a route. — Jay Carney

The true function of logic ... as applied to matters of experience ... is analytic rather than constructive; taken a priori, it shows the possibility of hitherto unsuspected alternatives more often than the impossibility of alternatives which seemed prima facie possible. Thus, while it liberates imagination as to what the world may be, it refuses to legislate as to what the world is — Bertrand Russell

You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. — Adrian Rogers

While the word "republic" derives etymologically from the Latin "res publica" - which literally means "the people's thing," what a republic or a "republican form of government" is today remains debatable; but what it is not is clear: No matter its political composition, a government that does not adhere to the rule of law, is ruled by a president who dictates, courts that legislate, and a legislature that is elected by a minority, led by the few, and administered by members who fail to embody the will of the people, represent party caucuses and factious special interests, overlook executive overreach, transfer legislative powers, and maintain monarchic lengths of time in office - and all of this to the detriment of justice, the Union, and the Constitution - is not a republic or republican form of government but something else. — Anonymous

If anyone tells you that you cannot legislate morality, remeber that legislation IS morality. — Jay Alan Sekulow

Conservatives are also against unions and want to legislate them out of existence via what are called "right to work" laws. Such laws see employment through a Strict Father lens: as simply a matter of individual responsibility by the employee. Conservative enmity against unions follows from the moral hierarchy: Rich Over Poor; Employer Over Employee. Unions are actually agents of freedom - freedom from corporate servitude and wage slavery. Without unions, employees have to individually take what is offered, usually far less than they would get with a union: not just pay but worker safety, health care benefits, pensions, reasonable working conditions and hours, reasonable vacation time. What is "reasonable"? What the union members can negotiate. Unions create freedom. Austerity — George Lakoff

It is impossible to legislate without legislating morality. Try to think of a law that is not based on a moral idea; you won't be able to do it. — J. Budziszewski

History has shown that one cannot legislate a culture of integrity. And yet, one of the paramount responsibilities and challenges of corporate leadership is to ensure such a culture. — Preet Bharara

In many countries adult pornography legislation is an attempt to legislate something else. — Eric Schmidt

Webster never goes behind government, and so cannot speak with authority about it. His words are wisdom to those legislators who contemplate no essential reform in the existing government; but for thinkers, and those who legislate for all time, he never once glances at the subject ... Comparatively, he is always strong, original, and, above all, practical. Still, his quality is not wisdom, but prudence. — Henry David Thoreau

It may be argued that peoples for whom philosophers legislate are always prosperous. — Aristotle.

Do the day's work. If it be to protect the rights of the weak, whoever objects, do it. If it be to help a powerful corporation better to serve the people, whatever the opposition, do that. Expect to be called a stand-patter, but don't be a stand-patter. Expect to be called a demagogue, but don't be a demagogue. Don't hesitate to be as revolutionary as science. Don't hesitate to be as reactionary as the multiplication table. Don't expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong. Don't hurry to legislate. Give administration a chance to catch up with legislation. — Calvin Coolidge

No man can be a competent legislator who does not add to an upright intention and a sound judgment a certain degree of knowledge of the subject on which he is to legislate. — James Madison

If you don't have collective agreements between unions and employers, governments have to legislate more. — Jacques Delors

I've been campaigning for 17 of the last 24 months. I'm ready to legislate and not campaign. — John Y. Campbell

Certain things we cannot accomplish ... by any process of government. We cannot legislate intelligence. We cannot legislate morality. No, and we cannot legislate loyalty, for loyalty is a kind of morality. — Alfred Whitney Griswold

Technology will move faster than governments, so don't legislate before you understand the consequences — Eric Schmidt

There are two ideas of government. There are those who believe that if you just legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, that their prosperity will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea has been that if you legislate to make the masses prosperous their prosperity will find its way up and through every class that rests upon it. — Alice Schroeder

Women administer the home. They set the rules, enforce them, mete out justice for violations. Thus, like Congress, they legislate; like the Executive, they administer; like the courts, they interpret the rules. It is an ideal experience for politics. — Margaret Chase Smith

Pat Moynihan could write books with one hand and legislate with the other. I can't; I have a short attention span. The slightest distraction would take me away from writing. — Barney Frank

Robert Bork, at opening of Judiciary hearings:
How should a judge go about finding the law? The only legitimate way, in my opinion, is by attempting to discern what those who made the law intended ...
As I wrote in an opinion for our court, the judge's responsibility is to discern how the framers' values, defined in the context of the world they knew, apply in the world we know.
If a judge abandons intentions as his guide, there is no law available to him, and he begins to legislate a social agenda for the American people. That goes well beyond his powers.. — Joe Biden

Reform must come from within, not from without. You cannot legislate for virtue. — James Gibbons