Edward Brooke Quotes

#1. Once bitten, you seldom lose the political bug.

Edward Brooke

#2. My fervent expectation is that sooner rather than later, the United States Senate will more closely reflect the rich diversity of this great country.

Edward Brooke

#3. Labels applied to people of any race are inherently offensive.

Edward Brooke

#4. I had male breast cancer and had dual radical modified mastectomy, and I've spent a lot of time working with the Susan G. Komen foundation to make men aware of male breast cancer - if you have breast tissue, you can have breast cancer.

Edward Brooke

#5. I've never tried to run away from my race. I was born a black man. You know that in your bones as soon as you are able to understand this country ... My approach to life about race is, I don't see the difference between black people and white people.

Edward Brooke

#6. I am not a civil rights leader, and I don't profess to be one.

Edward Brooke

#7. I was one of God's chosen few, no doubt about it. Not only being elected, but the joy and pleasure I derived from it. It was a wonderful life.

Edward Brooke

#8. Intemperance and intolerance serve no one, and hatred guarantees failure.

Edward Brooke

#9. The polarization of Congress; the decline of civility; and the rise of attack politics in the 1980s, the 1990s, and the early years of the new century are a blot on our political system and a disservice to the American people.

Edward Brooke

#10. When I arrived in the Senate, the moderate so-called Rockefeller Republicans held the balance of power.

Edward Brooke

#11. In my state, the Republican Party was the most progressive party.

Edward Brooke

#12. I wanted to go to Washington to bring people together who had never been together before. I wanted to break down the barriers between races.

Edward Brooke

#13. Historically we have rejected extremism on the left and the right. Centrism is the right course for America.

Edward Brooke

#14. The member of Congress who forgets his constituents' needs usually serves only one term.

Edward Brooke

#15. I had made my reputation on integrity.

Edward Brooke

#16. Fred Thompson was a law partner of mine.

Edward Brooke

#17. You can't say the Negro left the Republican Party; the Negro feels he was evicted from the Republican Party.

Edward Brooke

#18. When people treat corruption as a routine part of the process, you have something far worse than wrongdoing or moral failing. You have a political cancer that breeds cynicism about democratic government and infects all of society.

Edward Brooke

#19. My campaign confirmed my belief that although there are bigots in America, whose hateful rhetoric seizes the media's attention, the vast majority of people do not harbor such prejudice.

Edward Brooke

#20. When I left the Senate in 1979, there were several publishers who had approached me about writing an autobiography, and I knew that politicians write books for many reasons, but at that time, I just thought I wasn't ready and my story wasn't over, and I knew I had a new life ahead of me.

Edward Brooke

#21. Politics is not a tea party. When it is time to act, you have to move fast and decisively.

Edward Brooke

#22. My entire life has been devoted to breaking down barriers, to finding common ground.

Edward Brooke

#23. I was entirely comfortable reaching across the Senate aisle to work with Democrats.

Edward Brooke

#24. I chose the Republican Party early on in the 1950s and 1960s in Massachusetts. My father was a Republican, as was my mother, in Virginia.

Edward Brooke

#25. I grew up segregated, but there was not much feeling of being shut out of anything.

Edward Brooke

#26. President Nixon has lost his effectiveness as the leader of this country, primarily because he has lost the confidence of the people.

Edward Brooke

#27. I can't serve just the Negro cause. I've got to serve all the people of Massachusetts.

Edward Brooke

#28. When most presidents get in, they move to the center because they realize that this is a centrist country - even Reagan.

Edward Brooke

#29. I spent many years working for voting rights, but we still see sophisticated efforts, led by white officials, to disenfranchise black voters in local and national elections.

Edward Brooke

#30. I'm looking for the best person irregardless of political party, of race or religion, or color of their skin. Those things don't matter to me. I want someone who's qualified, who has a qualification to character and the integrity to do the things that have to be done to save this world.

Edward Brooke

#31. To stand still is to regress.

Edward Brooke

#32. Richard Nixon was a very complex man. I don't think he was a conservative, nor liberal, not even a moderate. He was a pragmatic politician. He loved politics.

Edward Brooke

#33. I don't intend to leave the Republican Party, but I would like to move the Republican Party more to the center.

Edward Brooke

#34. I want to be elected on my own ability. Only then do you have progress ... People should not use race as a basis for labelling me.

Edward Brooke

#35. I never studied much at Howard, but at Boston University, I didn't do much else but study.

Edward Brooke

#36. My parents taught me that racial prejudice is a sin, one that robs the world of great minds and talents.

Edward Brooke

#37. Election victories are a harvest. You plant the seed. For months or years, you water and tend them. In the election season, you reap the harvest.

Edward Brooke

#38. I deplored a system that made it more profitable not to work than to work. I wanted to help change all that.

Edward Brooke

#39. I always believed there would be an African-American president. It was something I'd dreamed about, thought about, but certainly did not believe would happen in my lifetime.

Edward Brooke

#40. In elective politics, it's up or out. You go up the ladder, or you get out of the game.

Edward Brooke