Justice Anthony Kennedy Quote - Liberty Quotes Blog

"The right to think is the beginning of freedom, and speech must be protected from the government because speech is the beginning of thought."

by:	Justice Anthony Kennedy (1936-) Associate Justice�of the�Supreme Court of the United States�(1988-2018)
Source:	U.S. Supreme Court, 16 Apr 2002, Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition
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Categories:	Government, Independence, Power
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Reader comments about this quote:

-- jim k, Austin
To think is the beginning of thought, beware of government/church indoctrination of socialism on a mass scale. -- Ronw13, Oregon
The beginning? Each and every, any and all rights are inherent in and inalienable with a beings existence. Consistent with matter, I guess the nobility of man's rights are first recognized as a faculty of birth. In a representative republic at the "laws of nature and of nature's God" (Declaration of Independence), the body politic's sole authorization is to administer said unalienable rights (not sovereign individuals) as a guaranteed system of justice. Carnal man has long left that system of Constitutional liberty and justice for all for/with a tyrannical dimension where rights have to be protected from government (2nd Amendment for example — no longer representative of rights). -- Mike, Norwalk
Being joint heirs with Christ, being sons and daughters of an Eternal Heavenly Father — a more accurate question might be, are rights in fact, without beginning or end? -- Mike, Norwalk