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Famous Quotes about Liberty
 
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When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer 'present' or 'not guilty.'
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
We cannot afford to differ on the question of honesty if we expect our republic permanently to endure. Honesty is not so much a credit as an absolute prerequisite to efficient service to the public. Unless a man is honest, we have no right to keep him in public life; it matters not how brilliant his capacity.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
The one absolute certain way to bring this nation to ruin ... would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
-- Theodore Roosevelt		 
Nannyism is fascism on training wheels.
-- R. L. Root		 
Lottery tickets are the only consumer products actively promoted and sold by the state. The state does not sell toothpaste, or even promote brushing your teeth. But it tells people they should gamble. The main marketing concern is how to attract new players, who otherwise wouldn't gamble.
-- I. Nelson Rose		 
No man suffers injustice without learning, vaguely but surely, what justice is.
-- Isaac Rosenfeld		 
But it became clear as time went on that in Mr. Bush’s mind the New World Order was founded on a convergence of goals and interests between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, so strong and permanent that they would work as a team through the U.N. Security Council.
-- A. M. Rosenthal		 
During the last dozen years the tales of suppression of free assemblage, free press, and free speech, by local authorities or the State operating under martial law have been so numerous as to have become an old story. They are attacked at the instigation of an economically and socially powerful class, itself enjoying to the full the advantages of free communications, but bent on denying them to the class it holds within its power...
-- Edward Alsworth Ross		 
Although it had its share of strenuous Christians... the gathering at Philadelphia was largely made up of men in whom the old fires were under control or had even flickered out. Most were nominally members of one of the traditional churches in their part of the country.. and most were men who could take their religion or leave it alone. Although no one in this sober gathering would have dreamed of invoking the Goddess of Reason, neither would anyone have dared to proclaim his opinions had the support of the God of Abraham and Paul. The Convention of 1787 was highly rationalist and even secular in spirit.
-- Clinton Rossiter		 
The Americans of 1776 were among the first men in modern society to defend rather than to seek an open society and constitutional liberty.... Perhaps the most remarkable characteristic of this political theory sits in its deep-seated conservatism. However radical the principles of the Revolution may have seemed to the rest of the world, in the minds of the colonists they were thoroughly preservative and respectful of the past.
-- Clinton Lawrence Rossiter III		 
Based on strikingly irrational beliefs and emotions, modern liberals relentlessly undermine the most important principles on which our freedoms were founded. Like spoiled, angry children, they rebel against the normal responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental government meet their needs from cradle to grave.
-- Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr.		 
A social scientist who understands human nature will not dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral integrity -- as liberals do. A political leader who understands human nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive, personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and social equality on the population -- as liberals do. And a legislator who understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which over-regulates and overtaxes the nation’s citizens, corrupts their character and reduces them to wards of the state -- as liberals do.
-- Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr.		 
The roots of liberalism – and its associated madness – can be clearly identified by understanding how children develop from infancy to adulthood and how distorted development produces the irrational beliefs of the liberal mind. When the modern liberal mind whines about imaginary victims, rages against imaginary villains and seeks above all else to run the lives of persons competent to run their own lives, the neurosis of the liberal mind becomes painfully obvious.
-- Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr.		 
There 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. Rothbard		 
It is curious that people tend to regard government as a quasi-divine, selfless, Santa Claus organization. Government was constructed neither for ability nor for the exercise of loving care; government was built for the use of force and for necessarily demagogic appeals for votes. If individuals do not know their own interests in many cases, they are free to turn to private experts for guidance. It is absurd to say that they will be served better by a coercive, demagogic apparatus.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
We must, therefore, emphasize that 'we' are not the government; the government is not 'us.' The government does not in any accurate sense 'represent' the majority of the people.  But, even if it did, even if 70 percent of the people decided to murder the remaining 30 percent, this would still be murder and would not be voluntary suicide on the part of the slaughtered minority.  No organicist metaphor, no irrelevant bromide that 'we are all part of one another,' must be permitted to obscure this basic fact.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
It is also important for the State to inculcate in its subjects an aversion to any outcropping of what is now called 'a conspiracy theory of history.' For a search for 'conspiracies,' as misguided as the results often are, means a search for motives, and an attribution of individual responsibility for the historical misdeeds of ruling elites. If, however, any tyranny or venality, or aggressive war imposed by the State was brought about not by particular State rulers but by mysterious and arcane 'social forces,' or by the imperfect state of the world -- or if, in some way, everyone was guilty -- then there is no point in anyone's becoming indignant or rising up against such misdeeds. Furthermore, a discrediting of 'conspiracy theories' will make the subjects more likely to believe the 'general welfare' reasons that are invariably put forth by the modern State for engaging in aggressive actions.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a 'dismal science.' But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
It is not the business of the law to make anyone good or reverent or moral or clean or upright.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
The great non sequitur committed by defenders of the State, including classical Aristotelian and Thomist philosophers, is to leap from the necessity of society to the necessity of the State.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
Since the State necessarily lives by the compulsory confiscation of private capital, and since its expansion necessarily involves ever-greater incursions on private individuals and private enterprise, we must assert that the state is profoundly and inherently anti-capitalist.
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
It's ours to right the great wrong done,\\ Ten thousand years ago -- \\ The State, conceived in blood and hate, \\ Remains our only foe! \\ Oh, join us, brothers, join us, sisters,\\ Victory is nigh!\\ Come meet your fate, destroy the State,\\ And raise black banners high!
-- Murray N. Rothbard		 
Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes the laws.
-- Mayer Amschel Rothschild		 
Fortunately, political freedom and economic progress are natural partners.  Despite capitalism's lingering reputation as the source of all the world's evils, the fact remains that every single democracy is a capitalist country.  Half a century of economic experimentation proved beyond doubt that tyranny cannot yield prosperity. ... Socialism collapsed because it is a policy of unrestrained intervention.  It tries to fix what is 'wrong' with the spontaneous, self-organizaing phenomenon called capitalism.  But, of course, a natural process cannot be 'fixed.' ... Socialism is an ideology. Capitalism is a natural phenomenon.
-- Michael Rothschild		 
Either the application for renewal of the charter (for the First Bank of the United States) is granted, or the United States will find itself involved in a most disastrous war.
-- Baron Nathan Mayer Rothschild		 
I care not what puppet is placed on the throne of England to rule the Empire, ...The man that controls Britain's money supply controls the British Empire. And I control the money supply.
-- Baron Nathan Mayer Rothschild		 
Nature never deceives us; it is always we who deceive ourselves.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
The strongest is never strong enough to be always the master, unless he transforms his strength into right, and obedience into duty.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
Man was born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
There is no subjugation so perfect as that which keeps the appearance of freedom for in that way one captures volition itself.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
The most absolute authority is that which penetrates into a man’s innermost being and concerns itself no less with his will than with his actions.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
There is no subjugation so perfect as that which keeps the appearance of freedom for in that way one captures volition itself.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
The problem is to find a form of association which will defend and protect with the whole common force the person and goods of each associate, and in which each, while uniting himself with all, may still obey himself alone, and remain as free as before.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
Liberty is not to be found in any form of government; she is in the heart of the free man; he bears her with him everywhere.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau		 
The surest way to ruin a promising career in economics, whether professional or academic, is to venture into the 'cranks and crackpots' world of suggestions for reform of the financial system.
-- Michael Rowbotham		 
This assumption about religion being necessary for morality is recognized and used as a justification for religion. When atheists provide arguments showing that religious beliefs are incorrect and illogical, a frequent response is that religion is still good because it's needed for morality. The question of truth is dismissed as less important than the question of usefulness. If morality is a good thing, then atheist arguments fall on deaf ears. And more, the act of willfully ignoring evidence or argument is performed with a sense of moral pride. This position rests on the myth that morality requires religion, and that you have to accept religion despite any flaws or abandon morality. This justification of religion is just one more consequence of the myth.
-- Joseph Rowlands		 
Liberty is not a cruise ship full of pampered passengers. Liberty is a man-of-war, and we are all crew.
-- Kenneth W. Royce		 
In March, 1982, Kennesaw, Georgia, passed a mandatory gun ownership ordinance which requires all heads of households to own a firearm—handgun, rifle or shotgun. In 1982, our crime against persons, which include murder, rape, armed robbery, aggravated assault and residential burglary, decreased 74%. In 1983 these same crimes decreased [an additional] 46%. ... I would also like you to be aware that our population has increased in excess of 20% since 1982. We have had no accidents nor incidents involving our citizens with regards to firearms. ... It is a pleasure to see our senior citizens strolling the streets at night without fear of becoming a victim of violent crime.
-- Robert L. Ruble		 
The blame for [the national debt] lies with the Congress and the President, with Democrats and Republicans alike, most all of whom have been unwilling to make the hard choices or to explain to the American people that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
-- Warren Rudman		 
Ruff's Third Law of Economic Dynamics: "An economy in motion tends to stay in motion, and an economy at rest tends to stay at rest. A free market is constantly in motion. A centrally planned market slows until it eventually dies completely.
-- Mike Ruff		 
I never could believe that Providence had sent a few men into the world, ready booted and spurred to ride, and millions ready saddled and bridled to be ridden.
-- Richard Rumbold		 
Political scientists almost everywhere have promoted the expansion of government power. They have functioned as the clergy of oppression.
-- Rudolph J. Rummel		 
Nobody can be trusted with unlimited power. The more power a regime has, the more likely people will be killed. This is a major reason for promoting freedom.
-- Rudolph J. Rummel		 
The more power a government has, the more it can act arbitrarily according to the whims and desires of the elite and murder its foreign and domestic subjects. The more constrained the power of governments, the more power is diffused, checked and balanced, the less it will aggress on others and commit democide. ... In total, during the first eighty-eight years of this century, almost 170 million men, women, and children have been shot, beaten, tortured, knifed, burned, starved, frozen, crushed, or worked to death; buried alive, drowned, hung, bombed, or killed in any other of the myriad ways governments have inflicted death on unarmed, helpless citizens and foreigners. The dead could conceivably be nearly 360 million people. It is as though our species has been devastated by a modern Black Plague. And indeed it has, but a plague of Power, not of germs.
-- Rudolph J. Rummel		 
The way to virtually eliminate genocide and mass murder appears to be through restricting and checking power. This means to foster democratic freedom.
-- Rudolph J. Rummel		 
What will follow will not be a repeat of any other conflict. It will be of a force and scope and scale that has been beyond what has been seen before.
-- Donald Rumsfeld		 
Freedom can exist only in the society of knowledge. Without learning, men are incapable of knowing their rights
-- Dr. Benjamin Rush		 
Liberty without virtue would be no blessing to us.
-- Dr. Benjamin Rush		 
The only foundation for... a republic is to be laid in Religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments.
-- Dr. Benjamin Rush		 
Controversy is only dreaded by the advocates of error.
-- Dr. Benjamin Rush		 
Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught, at the same time, that he must forsake, and even forget them, when the welfare of his country requires it.
-- Dr. Benjamin Rush		 
Freedom of speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself. What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.
-- Salman Rushdie		 
Free societies…are societies in motion, and with motion comes tension, dissent, friction. Free people strike sparks, and those sparks are the best evidence of freedom’s existence.
-- Salman Rushdie		 
The worst, most insidious effect of censorship is that, in the end, it can deaden the imagination of the people. Where there is no debate, it is hard to go on remembering, every day, that there is a suppressed side to every argument.
-- Salman Rushdie		 
To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education.
-- John Ruskin		 
One evening, when I was yet in my nurse’s arms, I wanted to touch the tea urn, which was boiling merrily... My nurse would have taken me away from the urn, but my mother said 'Let him touch it.' So I touched it -- and that was my first lesson in the meaning of liberty.
-- John Ruskin		 
Let us reform our schools, and we shall find little reform needed in our prisons.
-- John Ruskin		 
Without seeking, truth cannot be known at all. It can neither be declared from pulpits, nor set down in articles, nor in any wise prepared and sold in packages ready for use. Truth must be ground for every man by itself out of it such, with such help as he can get, indeed, but not without stern labor of his own.
-- John Ruskin		 
Large fortunes are all founded either on the occupation of land, or lending or the taxation of labor.
-- John Ruskin		 
Wise laws and just restraints are to a noble nation not chains, but chains of mail, -- strength and defense, though something of an incumbrance.
-- John Ruskin		 
The highest reward for man’s toil is not what he gets for it, but what he becomes by it.
-- John Ruskin		 
There is no wealth but life.
-- John Ruskin		 
That treacherous phantom which men call Liberty.
-- John Ruskin		 
Dogma demands authority, rather than intelligent thought, as the source of opinion; it requires persecution of heretics and hostility to unbelievers; it asks of its disciples that they should inhibit natural kindness in favour of systematic hatred.
-- Bertrand Russell		 
Every man, wherever he goes, is encompassed by a cloud of comforting convictions, which move with him like flies on a summer day.
-- Bertrand Russell		 
It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly.
-- Bertrand Russell		 
The argument against the persecution of opinion does not depend upon what the excuse for persecution may be. The argument is that we none of us know all truth, that the discovery of new truth is promoted by free discussion and rendered very difficult by suppression.
-- Bertrand Russell		 
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
-- Bertrand Russell		 
Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
-- Bertrand Russell		 


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