Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quoteShare via Email Print this Page Daily Quotes Archives2004-02-17 Feb 17, 2004Censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion... In the long run it will create a generation incapable of appreciating the difference between independence of thought and subservience.~ Henry Steele CommagerI am really mortified to be told that, in the United States of America, a fact like this can become a subject of inquiry, and of criminal inquiry too, as an offence against religion; that a question about the sale of a book can be carried before the civil magistrate. Is this then our freedom of religion? and are we to have a censor whose imprimatur shall say what books may be sold, and what we may buy? And who is thus to dogmatize religious opinions for our citizens? Whose foot is to be the measure to which ours are all to be cut or stretched? Is a priest to be our inquisitor, or shall a layman, simple as ourselves, set up his reason as the rule for what we are to read, and what we must believe? It is an insult to our citizens to question whether they are rational beings or not, and blasphemy against religion to suppose it cannot stand the test of truth and reason.~ Thomas Jefferson Feb 16, 2004The First Amendment says nothing about a right not to be offended. The risk of finding someone else's speech offensive is the price each of us pays for our own free speech. Free people don't run to court -- or to the principal -- when they encounter a message they don't like. They answer it with one of their own.~ Jeff JacobyWithout deviation, without exception, without any ifs, buts, or whereases, freedom of speech means that you shall not do something to people either for the views they express, or the words they speak or write.~ Justice Hugo L. Black Feb 13, 2004The freedom of each individual can only be the freedom of all.~ Friedrich DurrenmattTolerance implies a respect for another person, not because he is wrong or even because he is right, but because he is human.~ John CogleyIn a civilized society, all crimes are likely to be sins, but most sins are not and ought not to be treated as crimes.~ Geoffrey FisherToleration is good for all, or it is good for none.~ Edmund Burke Feb 12, 2004The legal code can never be identified with the code of morals. It is no more the function of government to impose a moral code than to impose a religious code. And for the same reason.~ Robert M. MacIverThere can be no truly moral choice unless that choice is made in freedom; similarly, there can be no really firmly grounded and consistent defense of freedom unless that defense is rooted in moral principle. In concentrating on the ends of choice, the conservative, by neglecting the conditions of choice, loses that very morality of conduct with which he is so concerned. And the libertarian, by concentrating only on the means, or conditions, of choice and ignoring the ends, throws away an essential moral defense of his own position.~ Murray N. RothbardThat government is best which governs least.~ Henry David Thoreau Feb 11, 2004The purpose of government is to rein in the rights of the people.~ Bill ClintonTo do evil that good may come of it is for bunglers in politics as well as morals.~ William PennShould we believe self-serving, ever-growing drug enforcement/drug treatment bureaucrats, whose pay and advancement depends on finding more and more people to arrest and "treat"? More Americans die in just one day in prisons, penitentiaries, jails and stockades than have ever died from marijuana throughout history. Who are they protecting? From what?~ Dr. Fred Oerther Previous week's quotes Next week's quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print