Quotes by Ford
"I am a Ford, not a Lincoln. My addresses will never be as eloquent as Mr. Lincoln's. But I will do my very best to equal his brevity and his plain speaking."
— First Vice-Presidential Address, 1973
"The political lesson of Watergate is this: Never again must America allow an arrogant, elite guard of political adolescents to by-pass the regular party organization and dictate the terms of a national election."
— Remarks about the Committee to Re-Elect the President aka CREEP, May 1, 1974
"I have not sought this enormous responsibility, but I will not shirk it. Those who nominated and confirmed me as Vice President were my friends and are my friends. They were of both parties, elected by all the people and acting under the Constitution in their name. It is only fitting then that I should pledge to them and to you that I will be the President of all the people."
— First Presidential Address, August 9, 1974.
"America needed recovery, not revenge. The hate had to be drained and the healing begun."
— On pardoning Nixon, A Time To Heal, 1979
Quotes about Ford
"John Kennedy had Camelot
Then Lyndon Johnson took his spot
Richard Nixon he gets caught
And Gerald Ford fell down a lot"
Then Lyndon Johnson took his spot
Richard Nixon he gets caught
And Gerald Ford fell down a lot"
"Hi. My name's Gerry. I like movies!"
— Gerald Ford, Futurama
"That Gerald Ford. He can't fart and chew gum at the same time."
"It was a terrible time, not for the Republican Party, but for the presidency. It was such a wounded and enfeebled presidency...I mean, we had a president who had never been elected to anything except, what? A district in Michigan?"
— U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
"Recently, a novelist thought to make a joke by putting President Ford's name in the title of a novel; thus, he sank his own book dead. Henry Ford, yes; Glenn Ford, too; but never the long-lost Gerald, who now neither is nor was."
— Gore Vidal, Palimpsest
"According to an ancient tradition, God preserves humanity despite its many transgressions because, at any one period, there exist ten just individuals who redeem mankind, without being aware of their role. Gerald Ford was such a man. Propelled into the presidency by a sequence of unpredictable events, he had an impact so profound as rightly to be considered providential."
— Dr. Henry Kissinger, who served as Ford's Secretary of State
