Patricia Ireland

“Some campaigns are not worth waging if you can't win; others have to be fought on grounds of principle regardless of the chances for success.”

“We may be in a tough time right now, but when we are in a tough time is when our movement gets really strong.”

“When I started law school I was shocked to learn that our legal system traditionally had the man as the head and master of the family. As late as the '70s and '80s when we were fighting for the Equal Rights Amendment, states like Louisiana still had a head and master law.”

“I know that it isn't just violence against women, it's how do we support ourselves and our families, how do we deal with health care for ourselves and our families? It's a bigger picture.”

“The opposition has moved from a blaming the victim to blaming the victim's advocate's statistics. Irrespective of what the numbers are, it's far too many.”

“We have to stop this violence. We have to make the political nature of the violence clear, that the violence we experience in our own homes is not a personal family matter, it's a public and political problem. It's a way that women are kept in line, kept in our places.”

“Most of us see Justice O'Connor as something of an icon, although we do not agree with all of her decisions.”

“They plan to ride into the White House on the Sweet Talk Express. Well, think again. Bush and Cheney are not compassionate conservatives. They are ruthless reactionaries.”

“Extremely strong, effective, tenacious, and powerful political networks can be built when you fight losing battles as well as when you win.”

“When I hear traditional family values raised, I hear that effort once again to re-establish the man as head and master of his family. Who had the, not only the right, but the obligation to discipline his wife and children to keep them in line?”

“Some of us may just, in one-on-one conversations with our family, with our friends, over the back fence with our neighbors, talk about the reality of our lives and realize that we're not alone, that we have a right to be physically safe and emotionally safe in our own homes.”

“I have a very personal interest. I am a Miami-Dade voter. One of the issues is that my vote and so many other votes of women and African Americans in Florida are being discounted or discarded. I want my vote to count.”

“In any grass-roots campaign, building an ongoing base of support is as important as winning the ultimate goal.”

“I want to organize so that women see ourselves as people who are entitled to power, entitled to leadership.”

“Violence may be a good focus to organize around, but we have to look at women's lives in our entirety.”