Barack Obama

[living at the White House] This isn’t about us. There’s so much history here that no one family can claim this space as their own.

And in my own life, in my own small way, I’ve tried to give back to this country that has given me so much. That’s why I left a job at a law firm for a career in public service, working to empower young people to volunteer in their communities. Because I believe that each of us – no matter what our age or background or walk of life – each of us has something to contribute to the life of this nation.

My first four jobs were minimum wage or close to it.

You can’t deny women their basic rights and pretend it’s about your ‘religious freedom’. If you don’t like birth control, don’t use it. Religious freedom doesn’t mean that you can force others to live by your own beliefs.

Women are not a special interest group. They are half of this country and they are perfectly capable of making their own choices about their health.

What Michelle has done is to remind me every day of the virtues of order.

Husbands and wives, first be faithful to each other. Second, keep the romance going all of your life by courting each other every day.

It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.

A man’s friendships are, like his will, invalidated by marriage – but they are also no less invalidated by the marriage of his friends.

My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you’ll be happy; if not, you’ll become a philosopher.

By taking a second wife he pays the highest compliment to the first, by showing that she made him so happy as a married man, that he wishes to be so a second time.

They that Marry for Money cannot have the true Satisfaction of Marriage; the requisite Means being wanting.

This is my first marriage. Beforehand, I was living in sin.

[on Michelle] A dedicated mom, a good friend, and someone who’s not afraid to poke a little fun at herself from time to time

It has to be a true partnership, and you have to really really like and respect the person you’re married to because it is a hard road.

What Michelle has done is to remind me every day of the virtues of order.

Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures.

Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest.

Call no man unhappy until he is married.

The greatest day of my life was the day I married Mrs. Ford.

There is nothing so much seduces reason from vigilance as the thought of passing life with an amiable woman in marriage.