SENATOR PACKWOOD RESIGNS : Voices

“This is a moment for grieving.”

--Sen. John McCain of Arizona, one of several lawmakers who lavished praise on their disgraced colleague.

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“I think Sen. Packwood has made the right decision. It’s not easy. It hasn’t been easy.”

--Sen. Bob Dole, whose own voice broke as he praise his longtime colleague and friend.

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“I leave this institution not with malice, but with love.”

--Packwood

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“These were not stolen kisses...There was a habitual pattern of aggressive, blatantly sexual advances, mostly directed at members of his own staff or others whose livelihoods were connected in some way to his power and authority as a senator.”

--Mitch McConnell, Ethics Committee chairman

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“He was the man who always fought so hard for women and their rights.”

--Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.)

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“It turns on its ear the old-fashioned assumption that if I’m a senator or an important person in politics or government, I can do whatever I want.”

--Kathryn Rodgers, executive director of the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund

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“It’s fairly gratifying to realize it would come to this....It will be more difficult for men to do this and get away with it.”

--Jean McMahon, who said Packwood chased her around a table and kissed her while they were discussing a speech she wrote for him in the mid-1970s.

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“Don’t let a man be known for the last thing he does. Let him be known for the best thing he does.”

--Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.), quoting her father, saying Packwood shouldn’t be remembered for the accusations that brought his departure.