united-states-first-ladies

"American women have increasingly realized — as have men — the impact our opinions have in the voting booth and the marketplace. We have united to impact politics and policy, but also importantly to use our influence to help the poor, the oppressed, and those who suffer from mental or physical illnesses."

"I have already seen the butterfly garden, and I'd like to thank everybody who made that possible. And the movie, and I'm sentimental already. I have known Jimmy Carter for most of my life — I think for all of my life except when I was very small. He likes to say that he was my next-door neighbor when I was born, and he looked through the bars on the cradle and saw me. I didn't recognize him then."

"We need to end the silence and put pressure on governments and the private sector to prioritize mental health care reform. And the reform process needs to be guided by informed decision-making that includes the voices and stories of people with lived experience."

"To neglect those who, through no fault of their own, are in need, runs counter to our values, our decency and equality. Today, with our knowledge and expertise, we have a great opportunity to change things forever, for all people with mental illnesses, with what we know now, to move forward to a new era of understanding, care and respect."

"A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go, but ought to be."

"Rosalynn was my equal partner in everything I ever accomplished."

"Scientific advancements over the past three decades have greatly improved our understanding of the causes, nature, and treatment of many diseases and disabilities, including mental illnesses. Attention to the social determinants of health has led to the identification of risk factors and underlying causes of disadvantage and illness. Technology has made possible unparalleled public access to information so that more and more Americans know that treatments work and are available. Additionally, social networking provides multiple platforms from which advocates and consumers can organize and unite efforts to improve quality of life and address issues such as resiliency and recovery."

"Compassion is what makes our nation great. When we invest in the health and happiness of our fellow Americans, we reap dividends that pay off for generations. We urge our leaders to support all those Americans who are seeking to restore and maintain their physical and mental health. We can think of no better way to strengthen our economy, our communities, and our families."

"Recovery is one prevalence. Mental illness affects all of us. They touch every family in our country. One in four Americans is diagnosed with mental illness every year, one in four. This is one reason why I cannot understand why stigma is still so bad because everybody knows somebody, if not a family member, a close friend, living with a mental illness. Stigma is the third thing. Stigma is the greatest barrier to seeking care for individuals who have mental illness, the greatest barrier for a person with a mental illness. And it’s the greatest barrier for those of us in the field who are trying to do something about it."

"I want people to know that mental illnesses can be diagnosed, can be treated. The overwhelming majority of people can live full and productive lives in the community. People don’t know that. That’s one reason I wrote the book. But I want everybody to know what I know, so we can get over the stigma and go on to do what is good and right for people with mental illnesses."

"Thirty years is a long time in the history of caregiving as an issue in our country. The world was a very different place then. We used push-button phones, not cell phones, and had big word processors, not personal computers. There were social clubs, not social media, and people took care of each other because of a sense of familial responsibility. You didn’t hear much about “caregivers,” not because they didn’t exist but because what they were doing was quite common, and it was expected."

"Speaking up about this subject can be difficult. But the time has come for people who have lived with mental health disorders to make sure their voices are heard."

"I hope that no one will ever tell a girl that there is something she can’t do because she is a girl. I hope that women have and embrace the power to change things, so that every person can choose a life that offers them respect from others and deep satisfaction for themselves. I hope that equal education and equal opportunities are available for women to grow to their maximum potential, whatever that is. I hope women will use political power to make the world a better place and claim a natural role as the world’s peacemakers."

"I wanted to take mental illnesses and emotional disorders out of the closet, to let people know it is all right to admit having a problem without fear of being called crazy. If only we could consider mental illnesses as straightforwardly as we do physical illnesses, those affected could seek help and be treated in an open and effective way."

"And what will that future hold? Perhaps none have a greater right to ask that question than the young people of this country, and none are more qualified to answer. The ten teenage essay winners who participated in the opening ceremony had been asked: "How will women have changed this country by the year 2087?" Although they came from places as diverse as Dorchester, Alaska and the Bronx, New York, each was chosen because she or he had expressed a unique opinion or insight into the future role of women in our society."

"Maybe a hundred years from now we can say "We the People" and include all of the people of this great country of ours. If what we heard from each other and from our young people is an example of changing attitudes, we can truly look forward to the future as a golden age for women."

"I believe we are all here to help each other and that our individual lives have patterns and purposes. My illness turned out to have a very special purpose -- helping save other lives, and I am grateful for what I was able to do."

"The most difficult moments were trying to pull my family through my cancer operation. I really had to pull them through, and to try to make them happy because they were so sad and upset."

"Change, by its very nature, is threatening but it is also often productive. And the fight of women to become more productive, accepted human beings is important to all people of either sex and nationality."

"I'm not the type that's going to burn my bra or do something like that I really don't feel that strong about it. I feel that the liberated woman is the woman who is happy doing what she's doing, whether it's a job or as a housewife, it doesn't make a bit of difference. Just so she, inwardly, feels that she is happy and that she is liberated."

"The long road to equality rests on achievement of women and men in altering how women are treated in every area of everyday life."

"I feel absolutely marvelous. I just had my annual checkup and all my tests are completely clear. There is no sign whatsoever of a cancerous reoccurrence at this point. I am convinced that I am completely cured."

"But changing laws, more job opportunities, less financial discrimination, and more possibilities for the use of our minds and bodies will only partially change the place of women in this country. By themselves, they will never be enough because we must value our own talents before we can expect acceptance from others. The heart of the battle is within."

"Too many women are so afraid of breast cancer that they endanger their lives. These fears of being "less" of a woman are very real, and it is very important to talk about the emotional side effects honestly. They must come out into the open. It was easier for me to accept the operation, because I had been married for 26 years and we had four children. There was no problem of lack of love, affection, and attention. But some women don't have these same emotional resources, and it is very necessary to deal realistically with the fears about breast cancer."

"I think that there are sane women that probably have their husbands around the house more than they'd like. And then there are those that wish their husbands were home more."

"I do not believe that being First Lady should prevent me from expressing my ideas. I spoke out on this important issue because of my deep personal convictions. Why should my husband's job, or yours, prevent us from being ourselves. Being ladylike does not require silence."

"I have perfect: faith in my husband. But I'm always glad to see him enjoy a pretty girl. And when he stops looking, then I'm going to begin to worry. But right now, he still enjoys a pretty girl. And he really doesn't have time for outside entertainment. Because I keep him busy."

"As the barriers against freedom for Americans because of race or religion have fallen, the freedom of all has expanded. The search for human freedom can never be complete without freedom of women."

"Well, I think a Congressional wife has to be a special kind of woman. I don't think that all women, really, can adjust to this type of life."

"Cancer also produces fear -- and much of that fear cots from ignorance about the progress already made and ignorance of the need for preventive medicine for men and women alike. Cancer wherever it strikes the body, also strikes the spirit, and the best doctors in the world cannot cure the spirit. Only love and understanding can accomplish this important role."

"Freedom for women to be what they want to be will help complete the circle of freedom America has been striving for 200 years."

"We have come a long way, but we have a long way to go, and part of that distance is in our very own mind."

"While many new opportunities are open to women, too many are available to the lucky few. Many barriers continue to block the paths of most women, even on the most basic issue of equal pay for equal work, and the contributions of women as wives and mothers continue to be underrated."

"We have to take that "just" out of "just a housewife." We have to show our pride in having the home and family our life's work. Downgrading this work has been part of the pattern in our society that has undervalued women's talents in all areas."

"I told my husband if we have to go to the White House, "Okay, I will go. But I'm going as myself. And it's too late to change my pattern. And if they don't like it, then they'll just have to throw me out.""

"It shouldn’t take courage to be yourself. It shouldn’t take courage to go to school and walk down the halls as the person you know you are. It shouldn’t take courage to hold the hand of the person you love on a bus, to kiss them goodbye on the sidewalk, to share one of the most fundamental and beautiful connections that any one of us can have in this life. It shouldn’t but, too often and in too many places, it still does. And in some way, all of you here today have called on that courage. And you’ve used your voice to say: We will not go back. We will not let the progress that we’ve fought for slip away."

"We recognize it as an act of bravery and beauty, of daring and defiance. And we look forward to a time when that courage is no longer needed, when all people in all places can feel the freedom and the joy that we feel here today."

"So, it was late on a warm October night in Las Vegas. [W]e were all candidates’ spouses at the time, but there was an energy in the air that brought us all together, and we had the chance to get to know one another. And we made a promise then that our next Pride celebration would be on the South Lawn of the White House. And now, here we are once again, but it was just a little too hot and humid out there to be on the lawn."

"You cannot go into a war zone and come away unchanged. You don’t have to see the sorrow with your eyes because you can feel it with your heart."

"The state of Delaware has loved the Bidens and cheered for us in most of our triumphant moments. It has carried us through the darkest times in our lives with a kindness that asks for nothing in return. Delaware is family."

"Raul helped build this organization with the understanding that the diversity of this community, as distinct as the bodegas of the Bronx, as beautiful as the blossoms of Miami, and as unique as the breakfast tacos here in San Antonio, is your strength."

"There’s no scent of new notebooks or freshly waxed floors. The rooms are dark as the bright young faces that should fill them are now confined to boxes on a computer screen."

"Every body and every thing conspire to make me as contented as possible in it; yet I have seen too much of the vanity of human affairs, to expect felicity from the splendid scenes of public life. I am still determined to be cheerful and to be happy, in whatever situation I may be; for I have also learnt, from experience, that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances. We carry the seeds of the one or the other about with us, in our minds, wheresoever we go."

"I little thought, when the war was finished, that any circumstances could possibly have happened, which would call the General into public life again. I had anticipated that, from this moment, we should have been left to grow old, in solitude and tranquillity, together. That was, my dear madam, the first and dearest wish of my heart; but in that I have been disappointed. I will not, however, contemplate, with too much regret, disappointments that were inevitable. Though the General's feelings and my own were perfectly in unison, with respect to our predilection for private life, yet I cannot blame him, for having acted according to his ideas of duty, in obeying the voice of his country. The consciousness of having attempted to do all the good in his power, and the pleasure of finding his fellow-citizens so well satisfied with the disinterestedness of his conduct, will doubtless be some compensation for the great sacrifices, which I know he has made."

"Mrs. Washington who, like myself, had a passionate love of home and domestic life, often complained of the "waste of time" she was compelled to endure."

"I am not apt to forget the feelings that have been inspired by my former society with good acquaintances, nor to be insensible to their expressions of gratitude to the President of the United States; for you know me well enough, to do me the justice to believe, that I am only fond of what comes from the heart."

"I live a very dull life here and know nothing that passes in the town — I never go to any public place; indeed I think I am more like a state prisoner than anything else. There are certain bounds set for me which I must not depart from; and as I cannot do as I like, I am obstinate, and stay at home a great deal."

"It is owing to this kindness of our numerous friends, in all quarters, that my new and unwished-for situation is not indeed a burden to me. When I was much younger, I should probably have enjoyed the innocent gayeties of life, as much as most of my age. But I had long since placed all the prospects of my future worldly happiness in the still enjoyments of the fireside at Mount Vernon."

"If you know your light, you know yourself. You know your own story in an honest way."

"I've learned it's okay to recognize that self-worth comes wrapped in vulnerability, and that what we share as humans on this earth is the impulse to strive for better, always and no matter what."