Liberty Quotes - Daily Email History

"The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon … has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right."

~ James Madison  

"You say that freedom of utterance is not for time of stress,
and I reply with the sad truth that only in time of stress
is freedom of utterance in danger...
Only when free utterance is suppressed is it needed,
and when it is needed it is most vital to justice."

~ William Allen White  

"The right to discuss freely and openly, by speech, by the pen, by the press, all political questions, and to examine the animadvert upon all political institutions is a right so clear and certain, so interwoven with our other liberties, so necessary, in fact, to their existence, that without it we must fall into despotism and anarchy."

~ William Cullen Bryant  

"Nothing appears more surprising to those who
consider human affairs with a philosophical eye,
than the ease with which the many are governed by the few."

~ David Hume  

"The history books say that during the Progressive era, government trustbusters reined in business. Nonsense. Progressive 'reforms' -- railroad regulation, meat inspection, drug certification and the rest -- were done at the behest of big companies that wanted competition managed. They knew regulation would burden smaller companies more than themselves. The strategy works."

~ John Stossel  

"Freedom from something is not enough. It should also be freedom for something. Freedom is not safety but opportunity. Freedom ought to be a means to enable the press to serve the proper functions of communication in a free society."

~ Zechariah Chafee, Jr.  

"The superficial distinctions of Fascism, Bolshevism, Hitlerism, are the concern of journalists and publicists; the serious student sees in them only one root-idea of a complete conversion of social power into State power."

~ Albert Jay Nock  

"The State governments possess inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendancy over the National Government, and will for ever preclude the possibility of federal encroachments. That their liberties, indeed, can be subverted by the federal head, is repugnant to every rule of political calculation."

~ Alexander Hamilton  

"Big business in America today and for some years has been openly at war with competition and, thus, at war with laissez-faire capitalism. ... The left's attack on corporate capitalism is, when examined, an attack on economic forms possible only in collusion between authoritarian government and bureaucratized, nonentrepreneurial business. It is unfortunate that many New Leftists are so uncritical as to accept this premise as indicating that all forms of capitalism are bad ..."

~ Karl Hess  

"In a free market, consumer sovereignty and competition tend to create instability when sellers learn to game the system too well... In a technocratic system, it is more difficult for consumers to exercise countervailing power. Innovative competitors are often precluded by regulation. Suppliers tend to apply concentrated lobbying power to protect their interests, while the diffuse interests of the consumer are poorly represented in the political process. ... Centralized, regulated systems look good on paper, and they may be effective as they start. However, market systems learn faster, because competitive innovation prevents a market from getting captured by the incumbents who have learned how to game the system."

~ Arnold Kling  

"[Socialism] is a creed even more denigrating than Catholicism,
but it offers more tangible bribes for its acceptance."

~ Auberon Herbert  

"Make no mistake about it -- and tell it to your Republican friends: capitalism and altruism cannot coexist in the same man or in the same society. Tell it to anyone who attempts to justify capitalism on the ground of the "public good" or the "general welfare" or "service to society" or the benefit it brings to the poor.  All these things are true, but they are the by-products, the secondary consequences of capitalism -- not its goal, purpose or moral justification.  The moral justification of capitalism is man's right to exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; it is the recognition that man -- every man -- is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others, not a sacrificial animal serving anyone's need."

~ Ayn Rand  

"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected."

~ Gilbert Keith Chesterton  

"Being a politician means never having to say you're sorry. You don't have to say, 'I never should have voted to subsidize that ridiculous Enron project in India.' ... After all, they're greedy businessmen and you're a selfless public servant."

~ Harry Browne  

"When will the world learn that a million men are of no importance compared with one man?"

~ Henry David Thoreau