Zephyr Teachout > Quotes

“In 1970 only 3 percent of senators and congresspeople leaving office became lobbyists; now over 50 percent do,”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“The two national powers that dominated the colonies, France and Britain, represented two different models of corruption. Britain was seen as a failed ideal. It was corrupted republic, a place where the premise of government was basically sound but civic virtue—that of the public and public officials—was degenerating. On the other hand, France was seen as more essentially corrupt, a nation in which there was no true polity, but instead exchanges of luxury for power; a nation populated by weak subjects and flattering courtiers. Britain was the greater tragedy, because it held the promise of integrity, whereas France was simply something of a civic cesspool.”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“The politician Patrick Henry is best known to history for his provocative speech to the 1775 Virginia convention in support of the American Revolution, where he allegedly shouted: “Give me liberty or give me death!” In 1789 Henry led a coalition of companies that successfully secured an agreement with the state of Georgia to buy thirty-five million acres of land close to the Yazoo River (mostly within what is now Mississippi). When word of the deal leaked, the public reacted angrily, and the Georgia government quickly modified the contract to appease them. It”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“Like liberty, speech, or equality, corruption is an important concept with unclear boundaries. It refers to excessive private interests in the public sphere; an act is corrupt when private interests trump public ones in the exercise of public power, and a person is corrupt when they use public power for their own ends, disregarding others.”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“Predation isn't merely a pricing and wage practice; it is also a political practice: one of its most powerful tools is local or state subsidies. In 2018, when Amazon was offered $3 billion in state subsidies to locate a new facility in New York City, the owner of the Strand, the legendary Union Square bookstore, wasn't having it. She told the New York Times, 'The richest man in America, who is a direct competitor, has just been handed $3 billion in subsidies.' The basic insight in her complaint is essential: any subsidy that goes to a particular firm necessarily hurts its competitors.”
― Zephyr Teachout, Break 'em Up: Recovering Our Freedom from Big Ag, Big Tech, and Big Money

“Historian Bernard Bailyn writes that the framers “never abandoned the belief that only an informed, alert, intelligent, and uncorrupted electorate would preserve the freedoms of a republican state.”47 The electorate—not just the elected—must be dissuaded from corruption. Because the new government was founded on the authority of the people, the people themselves must have integrity and be publicly minded in order for the nation to thrive.”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“But revocation was not enough for the betrayed Georgians. They needed to actually set fire to the prior act: The feeling of the Legislature was so strong, that, after the Yazoo act had been repealed, it was decided to destroy all the records and documents relating to the corruption. By order of the two Houses a fire was kindled in the public square of Louisville, which was then the capital. The enrolled act that had been secured by fraud was brought out by the secretary of state, and by him delivered to the President of the Senate for examination. That officer delivered the act to the Speaker of the House. The Speaker in turn passed it to the clerk, who read the title of the act and the other records, and then, committing them to the flames, cried out in a loud voice, “God save the State and preserve her rights, and may every attempt to injure them perish as these wicked and corrupt acts now do!”8”
― Zephyr Teachout, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United

“Nothing better illustrates the limits of the consumer model of change in the face of monopolized markets than the extraordinary success of the local, slow-food, organic agriculture movement and its simultaneous failure to make a meaningful dent in the way food is created. About 75% of all Americans try to eat local, organic food, and one survey showed that nearly 90% of people want locally grown food at the grocery store and would consider that as part of their shopping decision. As Stacy Mitchell, who runs the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, points out: 'The local food movement has gone farther than any other [consumer] movement in terms of widespread adoption...' Despite the health food movement's unmitigated success, and the fact that food is where people have the peak amount of leverage - they can buy or not buy, or 'vote with their pocketbook,' three times a day - only 5% of all farms are organic, and only 0.3% of total farm sales are direct-to-consumer sales. Monsanto may be widely reviled, yet Monsanto's power keeps rising. Consumer choice simply cannot get us a to a world where most farmers and farmworkers are treated better.”
― Zephyr Teachout, Break 'em Up: Recovering Our Freedom from Big Ag, Big Tech, and Big Money