Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quoteShare via Email Print this Page Daily Quotes Archives2004-10-12 Oct 12, 2004Our institutions were not devised to bring about uniformity of opinion; if they had we might well abandon hope. It is important to remember, as has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is that under its shelter many different types of life and character and opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.'~ Justice Charles Evans HughesThe makers of our constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness... They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone – the most comprehensive of the rights and the right most valued by civilized men.~ Justice Louis D. Brandeis Oct 11, 2004There is no such crime as a crime of thought; there are only crimes of action.~ Clarence S. DarrowToward no crimes have men shown themselves so cold-bloodedly cruel as in punishing differences of opinion.~ James Russell LowellThe function of the prosecutor under the federal Constitution is not to tack as many skins of victims as possible against the wall. His function is to vindicate the rights of the people as expressed in the laws and give those accused of crime a fair trial.~ Justice William O. Douglas Oct 8, 2004The argument for liberty is not an argument against organization, which is one of the most powerful tools human reason can employ, but an argument against all exclusive, privileged, monopolistic organization, against the use of coercion to prevent others from doing better.~ Friedrich August von HayekDemocracy, which began by liberating man politically, has developed a dangerous tendency to enslave him through the tyranny of majorities and the deadly power of their opinion.~ Ludwig LewisohnHe is free who knows how to keep in his own hands the power to decide at each step, the course of his life, and who lives in a society which does not block the exercise of that power.~ Salvador De MadariagaEvery government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories.~ Thomas Jefferson Oct 7, 2004Terrorism is the war of the poor. War is the terrorism of the rich.~ Leon UrisThere have existed, in every age and every country, two distinct orders of men – the lovers of freedom and the devoted advocates of power.~ Robert Y. Hayne Oct 6, 2004It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top.~ Hunter S. ThompsonThere are men – now in power in this country – who do not respect dissent, who cannot cope with turmoil, and who believe that the people of America are ready to support repression as long as it is done with a quiet voice and a business suit.~ John V. LindsayCivil liberty is the status of the man who is guaranteed by law and civil institutions the exclusive employment of all his own powers for his own welfare.~ William Graham Sumner Previous week's quotes Next week's quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print