And of course we are familiar with the English common law rule of thumb that said a man could in fact use a stick no bigger than his thumb to discipline his wife and family.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

Extremely strong, effective, tenacious, and powerful political networks can be built when you fight losing battles as well as when you win.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I come from a Christian faith. I am not going to give you insight into my particular beliefs.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I don't think you lead by pessimism and cynicism. I think you lead by optimism and enthusiasm and energy.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I just have that sense this is the reason we got Sandra Day O'Connor on the Court in the first place is because Ronald Reagan was running for President.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I know that Bush, for political reasons, is going to nominate a minority, a Hispanic man or someone where it will be harder for people on the progressive side to oppose and split some of the traditionally progressive or democratic constituents.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I want to organize so that women see ourselves as people who are entitled to power, entitled to leadership.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

I've talked to law enforcement officials at the state and local level who say that violence against women is going up. In any case, we think that it's an important issue whether it's going up or not. And we are determined to stop it.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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

Is a woman raped every three minutes or every six minutes? It is far too much, whatever it is.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

More than 10,000 ballots in Miami-Dade County have been rejected by some machine without any opportunity for a human being to take a look. That is just not right.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

Most of us see Justice O'Connor as something of an icon, although we do not agree with all of her decisions.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

My answer to those who oppose my appointment as CEO is that this is really a decision of the YWCA. They want to strengthen their grassroots to advocate on behalf of women's and children's empowerment and ending racism.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

Some of those men in power, we just have to change their faces because we're not going to change their minds.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

The Violence Against Women Act is so important. It provides money to train the cop on the beat, to train the judges that this is a new day, that we won't tolerate this violence and to know how to deal with it.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

The way to be a man if you're a little boy is to be willing to throw your weight around.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

There are a lot of people who worked extremely hard in the election who are still organized who know how to do door to door and phone canvassing, who know how to raise money.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

Violence may be a good focus to organize around, but we have to look at women's lives in our entirety.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

We always knew when we took on the issue of violence against women that somehow our opposition would come after us.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

We may be in a tough time right now, but when we are in a tough time is when our movement gets really strong.
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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?
- Patricia Ireland Quote

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.
- Patricia Ireland Quote