Rights And Freedoms Quotes:

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

- Benjamin Franklin

topic: Inspirational, Happiness, Peace, Social Democracy, Power Corruption

The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.

- Edmund Burke

source: Speech at County Meeting of Buckinghamshire, 1784

topic: Wisdom, Giving Up, Freedom, Liberty And Equality, Civil Liberties

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

- Abraham Lincoln

topic: Wisdom, Religious, War, Faltering, American Voters

I have sworn upon the altar of God Eternal, hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man", "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man", and "I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Change, Men, Mind, Individual Liberty, Theocracy

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Freedom, Government, Liberty, Liberty And Equality, Liberty Of Speech

In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.

- Mark Twain

topic: Thank You, Memorial Day, Courage, Independence Day Patriotic, Inspirational Patriotic

Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.

- Mahatma Gandhi

topic: Inspirational, Gun, Political, Misdeeds, Pro Gun

That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience.

- John Adams

topic: Gun, Rights, Second Amendment, 2 Amendment, Police Protection

To disarm the people... was the best and most effectual way to enslave them.

- George Mason

source: George Mason's address to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 14, 1788.

topic: Strength, Peace, Gun, Handguns, Disarming

Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.

- Samuel Adams

source: Samuel Adams (1946). “Samuel Adams: selections from his writings”

topic: Rights, Liberty, Together, Individual Liberty, American Revolution

Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.

- Louis D. Brandeis

topic: Government, Liberty, Purpose, Justice Truth, Law Courts

Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!

- Patrick Henry

topic: Sweet, Freedom, Business, American Revolution, Individual Liberty

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

- James Madison

source: Virginia. General Assembly. House of Delegates, J. W. Randolph, James Madison (1850). “The Virginia Report of 1799-1800: Touching the Alien and Sedition Laws; Together with the Virginia Resolutions of December 21, 1798, Including the Debate and Proceedings Thereon in the House of Delegates of Virginia and Other Documents Illustrative of the Report and Resolutions”, p.136

topic: Exercise, Secular Society, Law, Redress, Founding

People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.

- Soren Kierkegaard

topic: Freedom, Thinking, People, Just A Thought, Stupidity And Intelligence

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.

- Elizabeth Cady Stanton

topic: Inspiring, Women, Equality, Social Equality, Social Groups

The whole of the Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals... It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of.

- Albert Gallatin

topic: Rights, People, Majority, Individual Liberty, Individual Rights

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Strength, Wisdom, Veterans Day, Social Revolution, Manure

The Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms.

- Samuel Adams

source: Debates of the Massachusetts Convention, 1788.

topic: Gun, Strong Arms, People, Handguns, States Rights

America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.

- Jimmy Carter

source: Jimmy Carter (1995). “Talking Peace: A Vision for the Next Generation”, Puffin

topic: Inspirational, Real, Patriotic, Individual Rights, Rights And Freedoms

If we don't believe in free expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all.

- Noam Chomsky

source: Interview with John Pilger on BBC's "The Late Show", November 25, 1992.

topic: Inspirational, Relationship, Freedom, Freedom Of Expression, Freedom Of The Press

Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.

- Frederick Douglass

topic: Freedom, Power, Demand, Labor Union, Struggle For Freedom

Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.

- Louis D. Brandeis

source: Olmstead v. United States (dissenting opinion) (1928)

topic: Freedom, Men, Evil, Beneficence, Lurking

A right is not what someone gives you; it's what no one can take from you.

- Ramsey Clark

source: 1977 In the NewYork Times, 2 Oct.

topic: Giving, Liberty, Limited Government, Limited Freedom, Rights And Freedoms

A political prisoner is someone who is out fighting for his or her people's rights and freedom and is imprisoned for that alone.

- Leonard Peltier

topic: Fighting, Rights, People, Political Prisoners, Rights And Freedoms

Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense? Where is the difference between having our arms in possession and under our direction, and having them under the management of Congress? If our defense be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?

- Patrick Henry

source: "The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution: Volume 3". Book by Jonathan Elliot, 1836.

topic: Real, Hands, Differences, Handguns, Propriety

Patriotism is not a short and frenzied outburst of emotion but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.

- Adlai E. Stevenson

topic: Life, Wisdom, Patriotic, Steadiness, Frenzy

Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

topic: Winning, Men, Long, Rights And Freedoms, Bill Of Rights

No man is above the law, and no man is below it.

- Theodore Roosevelt

topic: Respect, Freedom, Equality, Law And Justice, Obeying The Law

To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.

- George Washington

topic: Inspirational, Leadership, Motivation, Soldiers At War, Inspirational Military

If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.

- John Stuart Mill

source: On Liberty ch. 2 (1859)

topic: Freedom, Civil Rights, Would Be, Freedom Of Expression, Liberty Of Speech

The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that... it is their right and duty to be at all times armed.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Gun Control, People, Southern, Strong Arms, Pro Gun

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.

- Margaret Mead

source: Margaret Mead, Robert B. Textor (2005). “The World Ahead: An Anthropologist Anticipates the Future”, p.12, Berghahn Books

topic: Inspirational, Life, Friendship, Social Democracy, Social Entrepreneurship

Good intentions will always be pleaded, for every assumption of power; but they cannot justify it ... It is hardly too strong to say, that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intention, real or pretended.

- Daniel Webster

source: Daniel Webster (1854). “The speeches of Daniel Webster and his master-pieces”, p.282

topic: Strong, Real, Gun, Property Rights, Freedom Liberty

Is the relinquishment of the trial by jury and the liberty of the press necessary for your liberty? Will the abandonment of your most sacred rights tend to the security of your liberty? Liberty, the greatest of all earlthy blessings - give us that precious jewel, and you may take every things else! . . . Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel.

- Patrick Henry

source: Virginia's U.S. Constitution ratification convention, June 5, 1788.

topic: Freedom, Jealous, Blessing, Individual Liberty, Guards Up

Whenever legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience.

- John Locke

source: John Locke (1947). “Two Treatises of Government: With a Supplement, Patriarcha, by Robert Filmer”, p.233, Simon and Schuster

topic: Freedom, War, People, Limited Freedom, Legislators

A strong body makes the mind strong.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Strong, Exercise, Mind, Mind Games, Mind And Body

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.

- Abraham Lincoln

topic: Life, Strong, Freedom, States Rights, Abolition

If the personal freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution inhibit the government's ability to govern the people, we should look to limit those guarantees.

- William J. Clinton

topic: Government, Evil, People, Personal Liberty, Personal Freedom

The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.

- William O. Douglas

topic: America, Government, People, Civil Liberties, Rights And Freedoms

...The Bill of Rights is a literal and absolute document. The First Amendment doesn't say you have a right to speak out unless the government has a 'compelling interest' in censoring the Internet. The Second Amendment doesn't say you have the right to keep and bear arms until some madman plants a bomb. The Fourth Amendment doesn't say you have the right to be secure from search and seizure unless some FBI agent thinks you fit the profile of a terrorist. The government has no right to interfere with any of these freedoms under any circumstances.

- Harry Browne

topic: Thinking, Rights, Government, Fbi Agents, Liberty Of Speech

Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States.

- Noah Webster

source: Noah Webster (1787). “An Examination Into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution Proposed by the Late Convention Held at Philadelphia: With Answers to the Principal Objections that Have Been Raised Against the System”, p.43

topic: Army, Europe, Law, Handguns, Pretense

What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Country, Freedom, People, Lethargy, Social Revolution

The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders...tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.

- Hermann Goring

source: Quoted in Gustave M. Gilbert, Nuremberg Diary (1947).

topic: Country, War, People, Media Manipulation, Media Propaganda

The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to permit the conquered Eastern peoples to have arms. History teaches that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by doing so.

- Adolf Hitler

topic: Mistake, Race, Gun Control, Disarming, Pro Gun

Laws that forbid the carrying of arms . . . disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes . . . Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Men, Law, May, Limited Government, Founding

On every question of construction (of the Constitution) let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit of the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.

- Thomas Jefferson

topic: Patriotism, Trying, May, Rights And Freedoms, Bearing Arms

Naturally, the common people don't want war ... but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.

- Hermann Goring

source: Interview in Göring's jail cell, April 18, 1946. "Nuremberg Diary". Book by Gustave Gilbert, 1947.

topic: Country, Peace, War, Media Manipulation, Media Propaganda

If gun laws in fact worked, the sponsors of this type of legislation should have no difficulty drawing upon long lists of examples of criminal acts reduced by such legislation. That they cannot do so after a century and a half of trying - that they must sweep under the rug the southern attempts at gun control in the 1870-1910 period, the northeastern attempts in the 1920-1939 period, the attempts at both Federal and State levels in 1965-1976 - establishes the repeated, complete and inevitable failure of gun laws to control serious crime.

- Orrin Hatch

source: "The Right to Keep and Bear Arms - Report of the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Committee on the Judiciary". Book by Dennis DeConcini and Orrin Hatch, February 1982.

topic: Gun, Law, Drawing, Pro Gun, 2 Amendment

We can't be so fixated on our desire to preserve the rights of ordinary Americans.

- William J. Clinton

source: Clinton, William J. (1994). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton, 1993”, p.223, Best Books on

topic: Gun, Rights, Government, Power Corruption, Limited Government