Top 500 William J. Clinton Quotes (2025 Update)
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451. “President Obama started with a much weaker economy than I did. Listen to me now. No president, not me, not any of my predecessors, no one could have fully repaired all the damage that he found in just four years.”

— William J. Clinton

452. “We must all be profoundly grateful for the magnificent achievements of our forbearers in this century. Yet perhaps in the daily press of events, in the clash of controversy, we don’t see our own time for what it truly is – a new dawn for America.”

— William J. Clinton

453. “We should pass a flex time law that allows employees to take their overtime pay in money or in time off, depending on what’s better for their family.”

— William J. Clinton

454. “When you’re president, you learn to act like you know what you’re talking about. And it’s a great skill.”

— William J. Clinton

455. “We are a people of faith. We have been so secure in that faith that we have enshrined in our Constitution protection for people who profess no faith. And good for us for doing so. That is what the First Amendment is all about.”

— William J. Clinton

456. “Our policy is guided by the principle that we will keep unauthorized aliens out of the United States, welcome legal immigrants, and protect refugees from harm. Our solutions rely on working in partnership with States and communities.”

— William J. Clinton

457. “I was also very concerned about protecting my family.”

— William J. Clinton

458. “For four years we’ve been cooperating exhaustively.”

— William J. Clinton

459. “President Obama’s approach embodies the values, the ideas, and the direction America must take to build a 21st century version of the American Dream in a nation of shared opportunities, shared prosperity and shared responsibilities.”

— William J. Clinton

460. “You live in a country that makes it harder to raise children than any other country in the world. You vote for me and I’ll give you family values.”

— William J. Clinton

461. “I think actually that the speech work I do is fine. It’s important, because I try to help people think about what’s going on and organize their lives accordingly.”

— William J. Clinton

462. “I want the ability to monitor high-tech communications among far-flung terrorists. I want to be able to have our people learn their plans before they strike. That’s the key.”

— William J. Clinton

463. “You can’t be involved in modern American politics without somebody attacking you.”

— William J. Clinton

464. “Though I often disagree with Republicans, I never learned to hate them the way the far right that now controls their party seems to hate President Obama and the Democrats.”

— William J. Clinton

465. “I have no intention of raising taxes.”

— William J. Clinton

466. “Somehow we all end up paying for what we do.”

— William J. Clinton

467. “I wanted to continue to be active on those things that I cared about when I was president where I could still have an impact.”

— William J. Clinton

468. “I came of age believing that, no matter what happened, I would always be able to support myself.”

— William J. Clinton

469. “I did have a relationship with Ms Lewinsky that was not appropriate. In fact, it was wrong. It constituted a critical lapse in judgment and a personal failure on my part for which I am solely and completely responsible.”

— William J. Clinton

470. “If you are focusing your anger at government, you are focusing your anger at all of us. Government is just a personification of this country.”

— William J. Clinton

471. “One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line.”

— William J. Clinton

472. “I never thought of political endeavors primarily in terms of power and prestige, and I never thought of economic endeavors primarily in terms of wealth and position.”

— William J. Clinton

473. “It is pretty hard to talk about responsibility unless you have exercised it yourself.”

— William J. Clinton

474. “The United States is too big and we are too involved with too many people for any president to be able to take actions that will be universally agreed to all day, every day and everywhere in the world.”

— William J. Clinton

475. “This remains a very important opportunity for the American people to have their day in court against big tobacco and its marketing practices. I urge Congress to provide the funding to allow the lawsuit to move forward, and not to shield the tobacco industry from the consequences of its actions.”

— William J. Clinton

476. “Today, many companies are reporting that their number one constraint on growth is the inability to hire workers with the necessary skills.”

— William J. Clinton

477. “We passed welfare reform. All of you know I believe we were right to do it.”

— William J. Clinton

478. “Only astrophysicists new about the Internet 20 years ago. Today my cat has a website.”

— William J. Clinton

479. “Life’s real victories must be shared.”

— William J. Clinton

480. “What we believe in is what works.”

— William J. Clinton

481. “Without question, bicycling is an efficient, economical and environmentally sound form of transportation and recreation. Bicycling is a great activity for families, recreational riders and commuters. Hillary, Chelsea and I have bicycles...”

— William J. Clinton

482. “Remember, Republican economic policies quadrupled the debt before I took office and doubled it after I left. We simply can’t afford to double-down on trickle-down.”

— William J. Clinton

483. “The world has never truly had to develop an ethic of interdependence rooted in our common humanity. And if we do it, the 21st century will be the most interesting, exciting, peaceful era in history.”

— William J. Clinton

484. “We cannot become the world’s policeman, but where our values and our interests are at stake, and where we can make a difference, we must act and we must lead. That is our job and we are better, stronger and safer because we are doing it.”

— William J. Clinton

485. “I personally don’t believe we ought to be raising taxes or cutting spending, either one, until we get this economy off the ground. I’ll pay more, but it won’t solve the problem.”

— William J. Clinton

486. “I mean, when’s the last time we elected a president based on one year of service in the Senate before he started running? I mean, he will have been a senator longer by the time he’s inaugurated, but essentially once you start running for president full time you don’t have time to do much else.”

— William J. Clinton

487. “I believe that people of my income group should pay more, and I explained why, but that won’t necessarily lift overall wage levels.”

— William J. Clinton

488. “There are always going to be people who want to be president, and some days I’d like to give it to them.”

— William J. Clinton

489. “I was an equal opportunity eater. Every ethnic group got a shot.”

— William J. Clinton

490. “We have to change the whole job structure of America. We have got to basically reorient our economy toward the future.”

— William J. Clinton

491. “The established order has too many self-protecting economic entities, and not enough people who yet understand what it takes to change.”

— William J. Clinton

492. “Let’s adopt some short-term strategies to get growth going and then let’s have a long-term debt reduction package. That’s what I think we should do and I think it will work.”

— William J. Clinton

493. “We know that progress is not inevitable. But neither was victory upon these beaches. Now, as then, the inner voice tells us to stand up and move forward. Now, as then, free people must choose.”

— William J. Clinton

494. “Even if it takes changing the law, the president should honor the commitment the federal government made to those people and let them keep what they got.”

— William J. Clinton

495. “If ever there comes a time when everyone you vote for wins and they do everything you think they should do, there will still be a gap between what is and what ought to be.”

— William J. Clinton

496. “If you wanna maintain 20 percent of the world’s income with 4 percent of the world’s people, you gotta first of all have more shared prosperity and shared growth.”

— William J. Clinton

497. “We must continue to deepen our ties to the Americas and the Caribbean, our common work to educate children, fight drugs, strengthen democracy, and increase trade.”

— William J. Clinton

498. “I was not elected to produce a pile of vetoes.”

— William J. Clinton

499. “If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction program.”

— William J. Clinton

500. “When you get asked hundreds of questions, it’s not possible to remember the answer to every one.”

— William J. Clinton