The Best Man

T.T. Claypoole:
Nice thing about you, Joe, is that you can sound like a liberal, but at heart you're an American

William Russell:
T.T. Claypoole has all the characteristics of a dog except loyalty.

President Art Hockstader:
Power is not a toy we give to good children. It is a weapon. And the strong man takes it and uses it. If you don't go down there and beat Joe Cantwell to the floor with this very dirty stick, then you've got no business in the big league. Because if you don't fight, the job is not for you. And it never will be.

William Russell:
[to reporters] And I am happy, of course, the best man won.

President Art Hockstader:
There have been moments when I have questioned your methods.

Joe Cantwell:
Well, you have to fight fire with fire, Mr. President.

President Art Hockstader:
And the end justifies the means?

Joe Cantwell:
Well, yes, sir. Yes. That is what I believe.

President Art Hockstader:
Well, son, I have news for you about both politics and life... and may I say the two are exactly the same thing? There are no ends, Joe, only means...

President Art Hockstader:
Major Bascomb... do I understand, by the way you are slowly beating around the bush, that Joe Cantwell is what we used to call a dee-generate?

Sheldon Bascomb:
Yes, sir. That's just what I'm saying.

William Russell:
I don't believe it. No man with that awful wife and those ugly children could be anything but normal.

Joe Cantwell:
I don't understand you.

William Russell:
I know you don't. Because you have no sense of responsibility towards anyone or anything. And that is a tragedy in a man, and a disaster in a president.

President Art Hockstader:
Y'know, it's not that I object to your being a bastard, don't get me wrong there. It's your being such a stupid bastard that I object to.

President Art Hockstader:
In those days we poured God over everything like ketchup.

President Art Hockstader:
You're not crazy, are you?

William Russell:
Any man that wants to be President is crazy.

President Art Hockstader:
[Slyly] You know, those rumors about you and lady friends... they won't do you a bit of harm.

William Russell:
I never pass a mirror, I don't look in it. I wonder why?

Alice Russell:
As someone sooner or later is bound to say, 'politics makes strange bedfellows.'

William Russell:
I was hoping it wouldn't be you.

President Art Hockstader:
Bill, do you believe in God?

William Russell:
Do I? Well, I was confirmed in the Episcopal Church.

President Art Hockstader:
Hell, I'm a Methodist, and I'm still asking. Do you believe in God? Do you believe in a day of judgement, a hereafter?

William Russell:
No. I believe in us, I believe in man.

William Russell:
[in response to reporter's question 'do you think people mistrust intellectuals like you in politics?'] Intellectual, you mean I wrote a book? Well, as Bertrand Russell said, people in a democracy tend to think they have less to fear from a stupid man than an intelligent one. I think it's the other way around. I think it's the stupid man.

President Art Hockstader:
[to William Russell] Time was, when you rich boys liked to play games like polo. Now you play politics.

President Art Hockstader:
[to William Russell] You're a very superior man, Bill, the kind we don't often find in politics.

President Art Hockstader:
[to William Russell] Well, son, you've got such a good mind, that sometimes you get so busy thinking how complex everything is, that important problems don't get solved.

William Russell:
[speaking of Mrs. Gamadge] The only known link between the NAACP and the Ku Klux Klan.

Sue Ellen Gamadge:
You are not the ideal candidate for women.

William Russell:
Which women do you have in mind?

Sue Ellen Gamadge:
The women don't like you trying to be funny all the time.

William Russell:
Oh, no. It is a flaw, I agree.

Sue Ellen Gamadge:
They want a regular kind of man, like, well, like General Eisenhower. With that nice smile. And he's not pushy or aggressive, or any of those things we women don't like about men. He was just grand... Just don't try to be smart aleck and talk over our poor heads.