William Howard Taft
Take away from the courts, if it could be taken away, the power to issue injunctions in labor disputes, and it would create a privileged class among the laborers and save the lawless among their number from a most needful remedy available to all men for the protection of their business interests against unlawful invasion.... The secondary boycott is an instrument of tyranny, and ought not to be made legitimate.Collection: Taken
I would like to have an ample fund to spread the light of Republicanism, but I am willing to undergo the disadvantage to make certain that in the future we shall reduce the power of money in politics for unworthy purposes.Collection: Light
The Government is able to afford a suitable army and a suitable navy. It may maintain them without the slightest danger to the Republic or the cause of free institutions, and fear of additional taxation ought not to change a proper policy in this regard.Collection: Army
There is only one thing I want to say about Ohio that has a political tinge, and that is that I think a mistake has been made of recent years in Ohio in failing to continue as our representatives the same people term after term. I do not need to tell a Washington audience, among whom there are certainly some who have been interested in legislation, that length of service in the House and in the Senate is what gives influence.Collection: Mistake
There is no legislation--I care not what it is--tariff, railroads, corporations, or of a general political character, that all equals in importance the putting of our banking and currency system on the sound basis proposed in the National Monetary Commission plan.Collection: Character
What I am anxious to do is to secure my legislation.... What I want to do is to get through that, and if I can point to a record of usefulness of that kind, I am entirely willing to quit office.Collection: Office
I am glad to be going. This is the lonesomest pace in the world?Collection: Presidential
We have passed the time of ... the laisser-faire [sic] school which believes that the government ought to do nothing but run a police force.Collection: Running
The true Mason ever strives to cultivate Masonry in his/her life to the fullest degree possible.Collection: Degrees
The Masonic Fraternity is one of the most helpful mediating and conserving organizations among men, and I have never wavered from that childhood impression, but it has stood steadfastly with me through the busy, vast hurrying years.Collection: Men
He [Roosevelt] has made some speeches that indicate that he is going quite beyond anything that he advocated when he was in the White House, and has proposed a program which is absolutely impossible to carry out except by a revision of the Constitution.Collection: White
There are a great many people who are in favor of conservation no matter what it means.Collection: Mean
My impression about the Panama Canal is that the great revolution it is going to introduce in the trade of the world is in the trade between the east and the west coast of the United States.Collection: West
There is no "but" in it. The way to be an administration Senator is to vote with the Administration.Collection: Frustration
I wish to reiterate all the reasons which [my predecessor] has presented in favor of the policy of maintaining a strong navy as the best conservator of our peace with other nations and the best means of securing respect for the assertion of our rights of the defense of our interests, and the exercise of our influence in international matters.Collection: Peace
The game of baseball is a clean, straight game, and it summons to its presence everybody who enjoys clean, straight athletics. It furnishes amusement to the thousands and thousands.Collection: Baseball
I do not think that there is any doubt about where I stand in respect to boycotts. If there is, I will just state what I think about them. They are illegal and ought to be suppressed. I would never countenance that which recognizes their legality.Collection: Thinking
It is not impossible, of course, after such an administration as Roosevelt's and after the change in method that I could not but adapt in view of my different way of looking at things, that questions should arise as to whether I should go back on the principles of the Roosevelt administration.... I have a government of limited power under a Constitution, and we have got to work out our problems on the basis of law. Now, if that is reactionary, then I am a reactionary.Collection: Government
It gives me the greatest pleasure to say, as I do from the bottom of my heart, that never in the history of the country, in any crisis and under any conditions, have our Jewish fellow citizens failed to live up to the highest standards of citizenship and patriotism.Collection: Country
In the public interest, therefore, it is better that we lose the services of the exceptions who are good Judges after they are seventy and avoid the presence on the Bench of men who are not able to keep up with the work, or to perform it satisfactorily.Collection: Men
Roosevelt could always keep ahead with his work, but I cannot do it, and I know it is a grievous fault, but it is too late to remedy it. The country must take me as it found me. Wasn't it your mother who had a servant girl who said it was no use for her to try to hurry, that she was a "Sunday chil" and no "Sunday chil" could hurry? I don't think I am a Sunday child, but I ought to have been; then I would have had an excuse for always being late.Collection: Funny
I prefer an income tax, but the truth is I am afraid of the discussion which will follow and the criticism which will ensue if there is an other division in the Supreme Court on the subject of the income tax. Nothing has injured the prestige of the Supreme Court more than that last decision, and I think that many of the most violent advocates of the income tax will be glad of the substitution in their hearts for the same reasons. I am going to push the Constitutional amendment, which will admit an income tax without questions, but I am afraid of it without such an amendment.Collection: Heart
Presidents may go to the seashore or to the mountains. Cabinet officers may go about the country explaining how fortunate the country is in having such an administration, but the machinery at Washington continues to operate under the army of faithful non-commissioned officers, and the great mass of governmental business is uninterrupted.Collection: Country
On the whole, yes, I would rather be the Chief Justice of the United States, and a quieter life than that which becomes at the White House is more in keeping with the temperament, but when taken into consideration that I go into history as President, and my children and my children's children are the better placed on account of that fact, I am inclined to think that to be President well compensates one for all the trials and criticisms he has to bear and undergo.Collection: Children
People run away from the name subsidy. It is a subsidy. I am not afraid to call it so. It is paid for the purpose of giving a merchant marine to the whole country so that the trade of the whole country will be benefitted thereby, and the men running the ships will of course make a reasonable profit.... Unless we have a merchant marine, our navy if called upon for offensive or defensive work is going to be most defective.Collection: Running
There is not a subject in which I take a deeper interest than I do in the development of Alaska, and I propose, if Congress will follow by recommendations, to do something in that territory that will make it move on.Collection: Moving
The game of baseball is a clean, straight game.Collection: Baseball
The admission of Oriental immigrants who cannot be amalgamated with our people has been made the subject either of prohibitory clauses in our treaties and statutes or of strict administrative regulations secured by diplomatic negotiations. I sincerely hope that we may continue to minimize the evils likely to arise from such immigration without unnecessary friction and by mutual concessions between self-respecting governments.Collection: Government
What I am anxious to do is to get the best bill possible with the least amount of friction.... I wish to avoid [splitting our party]. I shall do all in my power to retain the corporation tax as it is now and also force a reduction of the [tariff] schedules. It is only when all other efforts fail that I'll resort to headlines and force the people into this fight.Collection: Party