Marion Barry

Image of Marion Barry
I promise you a police car on every sidewalk.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Car
Image of Marion Barry
If you take out the killings, Washington actually has a very very low crime rate.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
The laws in this city are clearly racist. All laws are racist. The law of gravity is racist.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I am making this trip to Africa because Washington is an international city, just like Tokyo, Nigeria or Israel. As mayor, I am an international symbol. Can you deny that to Africa?
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
First, it was not a strip bar, it was an erotic club. And second, what can I say? I'm a night owl.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
People have criticised me because my security detail is larger than the president's. But you must ask yourself: are there more people who want to kill me than who want to kill the president? I can assure you there are.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
In Washington, I have worked hard for the people, and I've been loved by the people.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I am clearly more popular than Reagan. I am in my third term. Where's Reagan? Gone after two! Defeated by George Bush and Michael Dukakis no less.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Everybody in life has something that they get knocked down on. The object lesson here is not that you get knocked down - it is that you get up.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
What right does Congress have to go around making laws just because they deem it necessary?
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
The brave men who died in Vietnam, more than 100% of which were black, were the ultimate sacrifice.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
When you know more, you can do more.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
This is not a sham, not a game. This is the real stuff.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I read a funny story about how the Republicans freed the slaves. The Republicans are the ones who created slavery by law in the 1600's. Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves and he was not a Republican.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
People blame me because these water mains break, but I ask you, if the water mains didn't break, would it be my responsibility to fix them then?
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I have to admit I didn't do as much as I should have back when I was mayor, but now we're getting it done. It's not where you've been but where you're going.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I like boxing.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
My greatest work comes in the community.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
White folks may let you in their country clubs to play golf, invite you out to dinner, take you out to play tennis, but when it comes to dividing up the money, that's a whole 'nother story.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Washington, D.C., had never seen my style of politics.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Why should blacks feel elated about seeing men walk on the moon when millions of poor blacks and whites don't have enough money to buy food to eat on earth?
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Who can better help our city recover than someone who himself has gone through recovery?
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
I love serving people. I love helping people empower themselves.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
What dragged me down was not being mayor - it was insecurity, the need to be accepted by everyone, the pleasure syndrome. That's what brought me down.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Love is very fleeting with me. I don't know why.
- Marion Barry
Image of Marion Barry
Outside of the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Funny
Image of Marion Barry
There are two kinds of truth. There are real truths, and there are made up truths.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Real
Image of Marion Barry
I am a great mayor; I am an upstanding Christian man; I am an intelligent man; I am a deeply educated man; I am a humble man.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Christian
Image of Marion Barry
If you take out the killings, Washington actually has a very low crime rate.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Stupid
Image of Marion Barry
I had my bad times. But the good news is that every time this has happened I've taken full responsibility for it. I don't try to duck it, I don't try to dodge it, I don't try to bullshit about it. Truth crushed to the ground will rise again. And that's what my life has been about.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Taken
Image of Marion Barry
We got to do something about these Asians coming in and opening up business and dirty shops. They ought to go.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Dirty
Image of Marion Barry
There is a sort of an unwritten code in Washington, among the underworld and the hustlers and these other guys that I am their friend.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Guy
Image of Marion Barry
And no offense, but let’s grow our own teachers, let’s grow our own nurses—and so that we don’t have to be scrounging around in our community clinics and other kinds of places—having to hire people from somewhere else.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Teacher
Image of Marion Barry
People have criticized me because my security detail is larger than the president's. But you must ask yourself: are there more people who want to kill me than who want to kill the president? I can assure you there are.
- Marion Barry
Collection: People
Image of Marion Barry
The contagious people of Washington have stood firm against diversity during this long period of increment weather.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Weather
Image of Marion Barry
People blame me because these water mains break, but I ask you, if the water mains didn't break, would it be my responsibility to fix them then? WOULD IT!?!
- Marion Barry
Collection: Responsibility
Image of Marion Barry
Our neighbors in Virginia are just as responsible for these killings as the criminals are because they won't pass strong gun [control] legislation.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Strong
Image of Marion Barry
My personal view is very simple: What happens in your bedroom, it's up to you. If you want to use gay marriage as an affectionate kind of thing you're doing, do it.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Gay
Image of Marion Barry
Jesse ain't running nothin' but his mouth.
- Marion Barry
Collection: Running