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Henry Fountain Ashurst Quotes
1874–1962 United States
Henry Fountain Ashurst (September 13, 1874 – May 31, 1962) was an American Democratic politician and one of the first two Senators from Arizona. Largely self-educated, he served as a district attorney and member of the Arizona Territorial legislature before fulfilling his childhood ambition of joining the United States Senate.
United States Lawyers Pioneers Also known as: Ashurst, Henry Fountain
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8 quotes
There has never been superadded to these vices of mine the withering, embalming vice of consistency.
A speech is entertaining only when serenely detached from all information.
No man is fit to be a Senator... unless he is willing to surrender his political life for great principle.
It is still an open question as to whether mankind or insects shall ultimately inherit the earth. It is my opinion that mankind … has about a 50-50 chance....
Poker teaches self-reliance, self-control, self-respect, self-denial, and independence. But when cards are wild or are given fictitious authority, the noble game is robbed of its romance, grace and stimulation and degenerates into a gambling scheme.
I could throw 56-pound words clear across the Grand Canyon. As a matter of course, I went into politics.
Whoever in his public services is handcuffed and shackled by the vice of consistency will be a man not free to act as various questions come before him from time to time; he will be a statesman locked in a prison house, keys to which are in the keeping of days and events that are dead. Let me quote Emerson: 'A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen.'
You send me to Washington to represent you in the senate. But you do not send me there because you are interested in grave questions of national or international policy. When I come back to Arizona, you never ask me any questions about such policies; instead you ask me: “What about my pension?” or “What about that job for my son?” I am not in Washington as a statesman. I am there as a very well paid messenger boy doing your errands. My chief occupation is going around with a forked stick picking up little fragments of patronage for my constituents.
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