Ralph Nader

“ Senator Wellstone's desk in the Senate is now shrouded in black. His Senate colleagues unanimously passed legislation to apply $10 million to establish the Paul and Sheila Wellstone Center for Community Building in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Wellstones understood to their core the meaning of Jean Monnet's words—"Without people nothing is possible, but without institutions nothing is lasting." The essence of community is the banding together of people to do for themselves and posterity what they could not do alone—both in the civic society and in government. ”

“ At the short end of some 99 to 1 of 95 to 5 votes in the Senate, Wellstone's problem was that he did not have enough "old-fashioned Democrats" with him in the Senate. There may come a time when his statement that "politics is not about power; it is about people" will attract many more dedicated adherents throughout the land. ”

“ The corporate crime wave and the looting of the pensions and 401ks of millions of Americans losing trillions of dollars worried Wellstone. He wanted to help build institutions of investor and consumer influence to prevent recurrences in the future. ”