Mario Cuomo (1932-2015) Tribute List

Mario Cuomo, 3-term governor of New York and expert articulator of his party's principles, died on January 1, 2015. Cuomo became a national figure with a series of speeches in 1984, several of which are quoted below. The keynote address at the Democratic National Convention that year was so eloquent that many in the audience were left wondering why Cuomo wasn't the man the party was nominating for president. Whether he would have succeeded in that role or not, Mario Cuomo was a singular politician and a singular master of the language.
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  1. eloquence
    powerful and effective language
    I watched a small man with thick calluses on both hands work fifteen and sixteen hours a day. I saw him once literally bleed from the bottoms of his feet, a man who came here uneducated, alone, unable to speak the language, who taught me all I needed to know about faith and hard work by the simple eloquence of his example.
    —Democratic National Convention Keynote Address July 16, 1984
  2. calamity
    an event resulting in great loss and misfortune
    You want calamities? What about the Ice Age? … God made this world, but didn't complete it.
    — Quoted by Charles Passy in The Palm Beach Post, September 12, 2005
  3. affluence
    abundant wealth
    Most of us have achieved levels of affluence and comfort unthought of two generations ago.
    We've never had it so good, most of us.
    Nor have we ever complained so bitterly about our problems.
    —Commencement Address at Iona College June 3, 1984
  4. aspiration
    a cherished desire
    The closed circle of materialism is clear to us now — aspirations become wants, wants become needs, and self-gratification becomes a bottomless pit.
    All around us we have seen success in the world's terms become ultimate and desperate failure.
    — Commencement Address at Iona College, June 3, 1984
  5. mettle
    the courage to carry on
    How do we tell them that one not be discouraged by the imperfection of the world and the inevitability of death and diminishment. How do we tell them... that God permits pain and sickness and unfairness and evil to exist, only in order to permit us to test our mettle and to earn a fulfillment that would otherwise not be possible?
    — Commencement Address at Iona College June 3, 1984
  6. manipulate
    influence or control shrewdly or deviously
    If you can manipulate news, a judge can manipulate the law. A smart lawyer can keep a killer out of jail, a smart accountant can keep a thief from paying taxes, a smart reporter could ruin your reputation — unfairly
    — to NBC TV August 12, 1986
  7. prose
    ordinary writing as distinguished from verse
    You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose.
    — The New Republic April 4, 1985
  8. affidavit
    written declaration made under oath
    I am a trial lawyer. Matilda says that at dinner on a good day I sound like an affidavit.
    — to the New York Times 1986
  9. celestial
    relating to or inhabiting a divine heaven
    The American people need no course in philosophy or political science or church history to know that God should not be made into a celestial party chairman.
    — Speech at University of Notre Dame September 9, 1984
  10. innuendo
    an indirect and usually malicious implication
    In the end, I'm convinced we will all benefit if suspicion is replaced by discussion, innuendo by dialogue; if the emphasis in our debate turns from a search for talismanic criteria and neat but simplistic answers to an honest — more intelligent — attempt at describing the role religion has in our public affairs, and the limits placed on that role.
    — Speech at University of Notre Dame September 9, 1984
  11. talismanic
    possessing or believed to possess magic power especially protective power
    In the end, I'm convinced we will all benefit if suspicion is replaced by discussion, innuendo by dialogue; if the emphasis in our debate turns from a search for talismanic criteria and neat but simplistic answers to an honest — more intelligent — attempt at describing the role religion has in our public affairs, and the limits placed on that role.
    — Speech at University of Notre Dame, September 9, 1984
  12. Byzantine
    highly complex or intricate and occasionally devious
    People expect Byzantine, Machiavellian logic from politicians. But the truth is simple. Trial lawyers learn a good rule: 'Don't decide what you don't have to decide.' That's not evasion, it's wisdom.
    As quoted in The Quotable Politician (2003) by William B. Whitman
Created on Thu Jan 01 20:28:47 EST 2015 (updated Thu Jan 01 21:45:12 EST 2015)

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