Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.
| NUMBER: | 1447 |
| AUTHOR: | Daniel O. Hastings (1874–1966) |
| QUOTATION: | More power than any good man should want, and more power than any other kind of man ought to have. |
| ATTRIBUTION: | Senator Hastings’s remark repeats the sound of words made famous in an exchange in the Senate between Senators Lucius Q. C. Lamar of Mississippi and Roscoe Conkling of New York. Conkling, whose arrogance made him unpopular, was humiliated by Lamar, who was considered one of the coolest, most courteous members of the Senate. Lamar’s reputation for self-control gave his words an added sting. Conkling said that if Lamar charged him with falsehood outside the Senate, he would denounce him as a blackguard, a coward, and a liar. Lamar responded: “Mr. President, I have only to say that the Senator from New York understood me correctly. I did mean to say just precisely the words, and all that they imported. I beg pardon of the Senate for the unparliamentary language. It was very harsh; it was very severe; it was such as no good man would deserve, and no brave man would wear.” Though Conkling had served notice that he would attend to the insult at some other time, he never did, and his prestige was lost. He resigned from the Senate two years later.—Congressional Record, June 18, 1879, vol. 9, p. 2144. Also see Wirt Armistead Cate, Lucius Q. C. Lamar, pp. 348–58 (1932, reprinted 1969). |
| SUBJECTS: | Power |