“Poverty only tries men's souls. It is loneliness that breaks the heart.”

“No southerner had been elected President for more than a century, and it was a bitter article of faith among southern politicians that no southerner would be elected President in any foreseeable future; when members of the House of Representatives gave their Speaker, Sam Rayburn, ruler of the House for more than two decades, a limousine as a present, attached to the back of the front seat was a plaque that read 'To Our Beloved Sam Rayburn - Who Would Have Been President If He Had Come From Any Place but the South.”

“Son, always tell the truth. Then you'll never have to remember what you said the last time.”

“Any jackass can kick down a barn but it takes a good carpenter to build one.”

“Poverty only tries men's souls. It is loneliness that breaks the heart.”

“Sam Rayburn on LBJ's recuperation from his heart attack: "It would kill him if he relaxed.”

“The author describes Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn as "seldom at ease without a gavel in his hand.”