Bill Frist Quotations

I very much feel that marriage is a sacrament and that sacrament should extend... to that legal entity of a union between what traditionally in our Western values has been defined as between a man and a woman.

Every child should have the opportunity to receive a quality education.

September 11 impressed upon us that life is a precious gift. Every life has a purpose. And I think we all have a duty to devote at least a small portion of our daily lives to ensuring that neither America nor the world ever forgets September 11.

America is moving forward and gaining strength. We have been tested, and we have proven ourselves to be a tough, resilient and resourceful nation.

Space offers extraordinary potential for commerce and adventure, for new innovations and new tests of will. As Americans, we can't help but reach for the stars. It's our nature. It's our destiny.

America has the best doctors, the best nurses, the best hospitals, the best medical technology, the best medical breakthrough medicines in the world. There is absolutely no reason we should not have in this country the best health care in the world.

The valor and courage of our young women and men in the armed services are a shining example to all of the world, and we owe them and their families our deepest respect.

Social Security, a critically important, great program which does serve as the cornerstone of support for senior citizens, now faces challenges that threaten its long-term stability and well-being. The facts are there. The facts are crystal clear.

Education is the cornerstone of our communities and our country.

It is our duty and our privilege to keep America moving forward.

Voluntary personal savings accounts would enable future retirees to harness the power of the marketplace when saving for their retirements.

This legislation confronts the human truth that the need for clean water knows no borders, and proper management and intervention can be a currency for peace and international cooperation.

From slavery to segregation, we remember that America did not always live up to its ideals. In fact, we often fell far short of them. But we also learned that fundamental to our national character is the drive to live out the true meaning of our creed.

America enjoys the best health care in the world, but the best is no good if folks can't afford it, access it and doctor's can't provide it.

From blood banking to the modern subway, from jazz to social justice, the contributions of African Americans have shaped and molded and influenced our national culture and our national character.

Just two weeks ago, millions of Iraqis defied the threats of terrorists and went to the polls to determine their own future. I congratulate the Iraqi people for the courage they've shown in making these elections so successful.

Personal savings accounts to me are one of the most powerful things, not necessarily in saving, solvency, or bankruptcy of the program, but in guaranteeing, the words I used a few minutes ago, a safe and secure retirement for our seniors.

The African-American experience is one of the most important threads in the American tapestry.

The American people expect and deserve a government that works and leaders who work together.

Congress should be forward thinking in the policies we set, instead of waiting until catastrophe looms.

When we talk about safety and security of the American people, politics falls aside pretty quickly.

Education brings about opportunity, and in turn inspiration.

Our top focus - protecting our Nation - must go beyond homeland preparedness; America will only be secure if we deal with threats before they happen, not just after they happen.

Sound science must be a basis to governing our trade relations around the globe.

We still plan to complete Senate floor action on the Roberts nomination by the start of the new Supreme Court session, Oct. 3, 2005.

Until today, I've always regarded my most profound professional responsibility in my professional life the blessing I had to hold in my hands the human heart, recognizing all its glory and all its potential, and then technically seating it into the chest of a dying woman to give her life and a future she would not otherwise have. . . . A few moments ago, my colleagues gave me a responsibility equal to that -- some would even say a heavier one. I accepted that responsibility with a profound sense of humility. They gave me their confidence, their support, their trust -- and elected me to serve as their leader in the United States Senate.

We have no higher responsibility to our fellow Americans than protecting the homeland. Our lives, our freedoms, our liberties are at stake.

We have determined enemies who will use any means available to take the lives of as many Americans as possible. They cheered when the Twin Towers fell. They dream of even larger calamities. They must be stopped. And that requires an intelligence system that finds them, before they harm us.

The African-America n experience is one of the most important threads in the American tapestry.

In April, I asked my staff to determine if Senate rules and relevant laws would allow me to direct the trustees to sell any remaining HCA stock. In May, my staff worked with outside counsel and with the Senate ethics committee staff to draft a written communication to the trustees. After obtaining pre-approval by mid-June from the Senate ethics committee, I issued a letter directing my trustees to sell any remaining HCA stock in my family's trust.

In the wake of this disaster, the people of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida should know that the United States Congress stands ready to help them in their time of need,.

I am pro-life. I believe human life begins at conception. I also believe that embryonic stem cell research should be encouraged and supported.

The enemies of freedom will not prevail.

I am troubled that someone would sell a book, trading on their service as a government insider with access to our nation's most valuable intelligence, in order to profit from the suffering that this nation endured on September 11, 2001.

If we look to the future, when we talk about outsourcing jobs, when we talk about global competitiveness and our efficiency, none of that matters very much unless we have appropriate training and education for our young people today who are the workforce of tomorrow. It is an economic reality, and we are failing.

It is very important that the president thematically shows where we're going in terms of the vision and an agenda.

[I support] term limits for career politicians and the death penalty for career politicians.

The notion that you have a blind trust but you can tell your trustee when to sell stock in it just doesn't make any sense. It means you have a seeing eye trust and not a blind trust. It's ridiculous.

As a matter of principle, we believe patients should be able to see the right doctor at the right time. As a matter of principle, we believe nothing should interfere with that doctor-patient relationship. As a matter of principle, we believe all Americans deserve affordable, available, and reliable quality health care.

The number one killer of children in Rwanda is malaria. Since the United States of America stood up and working with Rwandans, we have been able to cut those deaths by two-thirds.

The United States has put more money on HIV, AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis than any country in the world and it's having an impact real quick.

We are a strong, robust, and prosperous nation. Optimism is the essence of our success. It drives our creativity and emboldens our entrepreneurial spirit. It is what makes us invest in the future and accomplish our highest aims.

As a physician I have sympathy for patients suffering from pain and other medical conditions. Although I understand many believe marijuana is the most effective drug in combating their medical ailments, I would caution against this assumption due to the lack of consistent, repeatable scientific data available to prove marijuana's benefits. Based on current evidence, I believe that marijuana is a dangerous drug and that there are less dangerous medicines offering the same relief from pain and other medical symptoms.

Individuals by themselves can make a difference. And by making a difference, you can improve the world.

We can no longer compromise America's border security, allowing potentially dangerous individuals and materials to slip freely across the border and into our country,

Since when does a senator's questioning of a witness become a sign of a lack of dignity or respect?

If we're successful today ... 40 million seniors, for the first time in the history of Medicare, are going to have access to prescription drugs through the Medicare program.

China and India are generating scientists and engineers at a furious pace while America lags dangerously behind.

I don't think we should legislate a track that gives a privileged status to people who broke the law.

If accurate, such an egregious disclosure could have long-term and far-reaching damaging and dangerous consequences, and will imperil our efforts to protect the American people and our homeland from terrorist attacks,

He has experience very few people in the United States have,

There is no crack there, the American people are behind this President.

We must dedicate our efforts to preventing terrorist attacks whether biological, conventional or unconventional by gathering intelligence and stopping events before they occur.

I think today a pluralistic society should have access to a broad range of fact, of science, including faith,

It isn't just a matter of faith, it's a matter of science, ... The president's policy should be modified.

Our Founding Fathers, who are cited so frequently and appropriately on this floor, believed deeply that a successful democracy and a viable democracy requires an educated and engaged citizenry. I am confident that by adhering to high standards of achievement and accountability, we will produce an education system worthy of their great hopes.

We believe there has been much overstatement in the American press over the last several days with regard to the use of military force in Iran.

Today, through the overuse of antibiotics, many of our most deadly diseases are showing significant resistance to our best line of defense antibiotics. It's critical that we find new ways to combat these diseases and ensure that doctors and patients are aware of the impact of over-prescribing on increasing antimicrobial resistance.

Today, we do fight a different enemy, but one that is no less ruthless, no less determined, no less uncompromising than our enemies of those wars past. Once again, we must stay the course. Once again, we must have faith in our Armed Forces. Once again, we must hold tightly to the belief that freedom will prevail.

We ask that at least until these issues are fully resolved, that the Senate not take any further action on the legislation,

We all have to sacrifice in various ways as we likely engage in military conflict, which we could not have anticipated a year ago, which is not fully budgeted and which ultimately will have to compete with what many of us want.

To me, I see no disconnect between that and stem cell research, ... I base my beliefs on stem cell research both on science and my faith.

With his passing ... the Supreme Court loses one of the most prolific scholars and brilliant minds ever to sit on the federal bench,

boil that can never be cured as long as it's covered up.

The signal that it sends, that there is in any way a lack of support for our commander in chief who is leading us with a bold vision in a way that is making our homeland safer is wrong.

The Supreme Court will embark upon a new era in its history - the Roberts era.

Now my hand, my hand can be grasped, and the hand of government can be grasped, by you, by your families, by your communities, and that others can together with us in government seize what may well be an unprecedented, unprecedented opportunity,

As a doctor, my first instincts are to help, and I was privileged to offer my assistance today at the scene of this horrible accident. My heart goes out to this family, which must face the start of the new year with this terrible tragedy. My thoughts and prayers are with them.

They put a stranglehold on the right of every senator to offer amendments and to have their views expressed, acted upon.

A country that cannot secure its borders cannot secure its destiny.

Democrats used scare tactics, ... They have no convictions, they have no principles, no ideas.

doesn't force any particular theory on anyone. I think in a pluralistic society that is the fairest way to go about education and training people for the future.

Consumers are feeling pain at the pump, and Republicans are moving aggressively to address their concerns.

Once again it shows the Democrats use scare tactics. They have no conviction. They have no principles. They have no ideas, but this is the ultimate,

the intelligence committee's progress of the Phase II review of the prewar intelligence and its schedule for completion.

If the UN refuses to make meaningful changes to the council structure, the US should lead a group of like-minded democracies with a demonstrated commitment to the protection of human rights to create an effective and accountable human rights oversight body outside the UN system.

If you have a mistake that is made, you need to be able to share it with people so you can develop systems to prevent those mistakes from happening in the future,

If your daughter has diabetes, if your father has Parkinson's, if your sister has a spinal cord injury, ... your views will be swayed more powerfully than you can imagine by the hope that a cure will be found in those magnificent cells, recently discovered, that today originate only in an embryo.

I do not expect that this year will be any easier than in the recent past, but I am confident that for the sake of this institution and the congressional budget process, we will do the most basic of our responsibilities this year-produce a budget.

I believe he will monitor and implement U.S. monetary policy that will ensure a strong domestic economy and maintain Americas global competitiveness.

The imprint of his gavel has been deep, ... His impact has been profound. Now it is cemented forever in our history. He leaves behind a legacy as one of the most influential chief justices in our nation's history.