| Few men of first class ability can afford
to let their affairs go to ruin while they fool away their time in Legislatures...But
your chattering, one-horse village lawyer likes it, and your solemn ass
from the cow countries, who don't know the Constitution from the Lord's
Prayer, enjoys it, and these you always find in the Assembly; the one gabble,
gabble, gabbling threadbare platitudes and 'give-me-liberty-or give-me-death'
buncombe from morning to night, and the other asleep, with his slab-soled
brogans set up like a couple of grave-stones on the top of his desk. - Letter to Sacramento Daily Union, June 20, 1866 |
 AI image created by R. Kent Rasmussen |
| In my experience, only third-rate intelligence
is sent to Legislatures to make laws, because the first-rate article will
not leave important private interests go unwatched to go and serve the public
for a beggarly four or five dollars a day, and a miserably trivial distinction,
while it is possible that a talented matron, unincumbered with children,
might go with no great detriment to the affairs of her household. - "Female Suffrage, Views of Mark Twain," St. Louis Missouri Democrat, March 1867 |
 AI image created by Barbara Schmidt |
|
I think I can say, and say with pride that we have some
legislatures that bring higher prices than any in the world. ...it's so hard to find men of a so high type of morals
that they'll stay bought. |
Quotations | Newspaper Articles | Special Features | Links | Search