Quotes About Accountability

Whatever motivated him, Lopsang's decision to tow a client didn't seem like a particularly serious mistake at the time. But it would end up being one of many little things—a slow accrual, compounding steadily and imperceptibly toward critical mass.

The LDS Church has annual revenues estimated at more than $6 billion, and

When cops and prosecutors fail to aggressively pursue sexual-assault cases, Kevin argued, it sends a message to sexual predators that women are fair game and can be raped with impunity. On

As Katie J. M. Baker observed in her Jezebel article, "In Missoula…drunk guys who may have 'made mistakes' nearly always get the benefit of the doubt. Drunk girls, however, do not.

Women don't get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they weren't careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.

Police and prosecutors are morally and professionally obligated to make every effort to identify specious rape reports, safeguard the civil rights of rape suspects, and prevent the falsely accused from being convicted. At the same time, however, police and prosecutors are obligated to do everything in their power to identify individuals who have committed rape and ensure that the guilty are brought to justice. These two objectives are not mutually exclusive.

Washington believed that every man was "accountable to God alone for his religious opinions" and "ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience.

But as Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., once said, "Righteousness is easy, also cheap, in retrospect." When we condemn posterity for slavery, or for Native American removal, or for denying women their full role in the life of the nation, we ought to pause and think: What injustices are we perpetuating even now that will one day face the harshest of verdicts by those who come after us?

The genius of America lies in its capacity to forge a single nation from peoples of remarkably diverse racial, religious, and ethnic origins….The American Creed envisages a nation composed of individuals making their own choices and accountable to themselves, not a nation based on inviolable ethnic communities….

from St. Luke: "For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required.

Watergate is a shabby, tawdry business that demeans the Presidency. Am I failing to lead by not stating that?

Well, what the hell is the presidency for?" he asked, if not to do the big things lesser men might not?

When we condemn posterity for slavery, or for Native American removal, or for denying women their full role in the life of the nation, we ought to pause and think: What injustices are we perpetuating even now that will one day face the harshest of verdicts by those who come after us?

what mattered was what you did once in power, not what you said in order to get there.

He exploited the privileges of power and prominence without regard to its responsibilities; to him politics was not about the substantive but the sensational

For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required.

The country has to awaken every now and then to the fact that the people are responsible for the government they get," Truman wrote.

The genius of America lies in its capacity to forge a single nation from peoples of remarkably diverse racial, religious, and ethnic origins….The American Creed envisages a nation composed of individuals making their own choices and accountable to themselves, not a nation based on inviolable ethnic communities….It is what all Americans should learn, because it is what binds all Americans together.

I knew that a President can appeal to the best in our people or the worst; he can call for action or live with inaction.

In his postpresidential notes, Harry Truman was candid about the tricky nature of democracy. Yes, much of the nation's fate lies in the hands of the president, but the voters have the ultimate authority. "The country has to awaken every now and then to the fact that the people are responsible for the government they get," Truman wrote. "And when they elect a man to the presidency who doesn't take care of the job, they've got nobody to blame but themselves.

He believed in constant conversation between the president and lawmakers, for Jefferson thought that "if the members are to know nothing but what is important enough to be put into a public message Ã¢â'¬Â¦ it becomes a government of chance and not of design."24

Nothing makes a man come to grips more directly with his conscience than the Presidency….The burden of his responsibility literally opens up his soul. No longer can he accept matters as given; no longer can he write off hopes and needs as impossible. —LYNDON B. JOHNSON

You never can tell what's going to happen to a man until he gets to a place of responsibility

The country has to awaken every now and then to the fact that the people are responsible for the government they get," Truman wrote. "And when they elect a man to the presidency who doesn't take care of the job, they've got nobody to blame but themselves.