42 Quotes by Mario M. Cuomo

It is not a government’s obligation to provide services, but to see that they are provided.

Democracy is not meant to be efficient, it is meant to be fair.

People expect Byzantine, Machiavellian logic from politicians. But the truth is simple. Trial lawyers learn a good rule: ‘Don’t decide what you don’t have to decide.’ That’s not evasion, it’s wisdom.

The Republicans believe that the wagon train will not make it to the frontier unless some of the old, some of the young, some of the weak are left behind.

We believe in encouraging the talented, but we believe that while survival of the fittest may be a good working description of the process of evolution, a government of humans should elevate itself to a higher order.

The mugger who is arrested is back on the street before the police officer, but the person mugged may not be back on the street for a long time, if ever.

I said I didn’t want to run for president. I didn’t ask you to believe me.

The American people need no course in philosophy or political science or church history to know that God should not be made into a celestial party chairman.

We work harder and we earn less. Income inequality is at the highest point in over a century. While American capitalism never guaranteed success, it did guarantee opportunity, for too many, the dream of economic mobility has been replaced with a nightmare of economic stagnation.