Liberty Quotes - Daily Email History

"The attempt to silence a man is the greatest honour you can bestow
on him. It means that you recognise his superiority to yourself."

~ Joseph Sobran  

"Let me make the superstitions of a nation and
I care not who makes its laws or its songs either."

~ Mark Twain  

"Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about
Glasnost and Perestroika and democracy in the coming years. They are
primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant internal
changes in the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes.
Our purpose is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep.
We want to accomplish three things:

One, we want the Americans to withdraw conventional forces from Europe.
Two, we want them to withdraw nuclear forces from Europe.
Three, we want the Americans to stop proceeding with Strategic Defense Initiative."

~ Mikhail Gorbachev  

I think that we should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death, unless they so imminently threaten immediate interference with the lawful and pressing purposes of the law that an immediate check is required to save the country... Only the emergency that makes it immediately dangerous to leave the correction of evil counsels to time warrants making any exception to the sweeping command, 'Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech.'

~ Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.  

"The bourgeoisie is many times stronger than we.
To give it the weapon of freedom of the press
is to ease the enemy’s cause, to help the class enemy.
We do not desire to end in suicide, so we will not do this."

~ Vladimir Ilyich Lenin  

"The intellectually stifling results of censorship
-- while deplorable in any setting --
would be all the more abominable if allowed
to exist within the college environment."

~ William M. Anderson, Jr.  

"Democracy is a process
by which the people are free to choose
the man who will get the blame."

~ Laurence J. Peter  

"Democracy means simply the bludgeoning
of the people by the people for the people."

~ Oscar Wilde  

"People often say that, in a democracy,
decisions are made by a majority of the people.
Of course, that is not true.
Decisions are made by a majority of those
who make themselves heard and who vote -- a very different thing."

~ Walter H. Judd  

"Repeal that [welfare] law, and you will soon see a change in
their manners. ... Six days shalt thou labor, though one of
the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be
looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase,
and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances
will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring
them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing
all your estates among them."

~ Benjamin Franklin  

"The evil of democracy is not the triumph of quantity,
but the triumph of bad quality."

~ Guido De Ruggiero  

"Democracy gives every man the right to be his own oppressor."

~ James Russell Lowell  

"Democracy is a device that ensures
we shall be governed no better than we deserve."

~ George Bernard Shaw  

"The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity."

~ James Fenimore Cooper  

"Democracy, with its promise of international peace, has been
no better guarantee against war than the old dynastic rule of kings."

~ Jan C. Smuts