Charles Ruff President Quotations

Now you have heard the managers' vision ... But I believe their vision to be too dark... I believe it to be a vision more focused on retribution, more designed to achieve partisan ends, ... Our vision, I think, is quite different, but it is not naive. We know the pain the president has caused our society and his family and his friends, but we know, too, how much the president has done for this country.

Give the course that these hearings have followed ... and given the special relationship between the legislative and executive branches embodied in our Constitution and our nation's history, we do not believe that it would be appropriate for the president to appear before the committee,

Whatever relevance such evidence may have to prove other elements of plaintiff's case, it does not have anything to do with the issues presented by the president's and Ferguson's motions for summary judgment. I.e., whether plaintiff herself was the victim of alleged quid pro quo or a hostile work environment, sexual harassment, whether the president and Ferguson conspired to deprive her of her civil rights, or whether she suffered emotional distress so severe in nature that no reasonable person could be expected to endure it.

It is neither necessary nor appropriate for the president to testify.

that conversations both with the President and among senior advisors, including the First Lady, are protected by executive privilege.

We know the pain the president has caused our society and his family and his friends, but we know, too, how much the president has done for this country.

The president has always urged everyone to tell the truth,

The president did not urge Ms. Lewinsky to conceal the gifts he had given her, and of course, he did not lie to the grand jury about that subject,

The questions ... were asked in a way that simply did not, and could not, for any fair prosecutor, form the basis for prosecution. The president surely did answer narrowly, answer carefully. The president did not want to reveal to Miss Jones' lawyers, or to the people ... that he had an improper relation with Miss Lewinsky.

The practical result of the court's decision is that the president and all other government officials will be less likely to receive full and frank advice about their official obligations and duties from government attorneys,

The president of the United States did not tamper with a witness,

The president knows what he did was wrong. He's admitted it. He's suffered privately and publicly ... But, Mr. Chairman, the president has not committed a high crime or misdemeanor ... His conduct, although morally reprehensible, does not warrant impeachment.

Whatever your feelings may be about William Clinton the man, or William Clinton the political ally or opponent, or William Clinton the father and the husband, ask only this: should William Clinton the president be removed from office? ... Are we at that horrific moment in our history when our union can be preserved only by taking the step that the framers saw as a last resort?

Do you ask the same questions about the trauma the nation suffers when you are removing a judge as when you are removing a president? ... That answer must be stunningly different when you are asked should the president of the United States be removed and the will of the electorate overturned.

Any suggestion by the Office of Independent Counsel or its public relations advisor that the president should do otherwise is reckless and irresponsible.

In the face of the seemingly insurmountable hurdle of Ms. Lewinsky's repeated denials that anyone ever asked or encouraged her to lie, the managers have persisted in arguing and continue to do so that the president did somehow encourage her to lie, even if she didn't know it, ... But neither the fact on which they rely nor their hypothesis was of much help to the managers before Ms. Lewinsky's deposition, and neither, surely, has any force after her deposition.