Liberty Quotes - Daily Email History

"The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest.
That would seriously interfere with business."

~ Clarence S. Darrow  

"The word 'politics' is derived from the word 'poly', meaning 'many',
and the word 'ticks', meaning 'blood sucking parasites.' "

~ Larry Hardiman  

"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  

"Just because you do not take an interest in politics
doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you."

~ Pericles  

"The most important service rendered by the press and the magazines
is that of educating people to approach printed matter with distrust."

~ Samuel Butler  

"Whenever people are
well-informed
they can be trusted
with their own government;
that whenever things get so far wrong
as to attract their notice,
they may be relied on
to set them to rights."

~ Thomas Jefferson  

"The highest proof of virtue is
to possess boundless power without abusing it."

~ Thomas Babington Macaulay  

"The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be,
first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern,
and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society;
and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for
keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust."

~ James Madison  

"Be not too hasty to trust or admire the teachers of morality;
they discourse like angels but they live like men."

~ Dr. Samuel Johnson  

"The ruling class has the schools and press under its thumb.
This enables it to sway the emotions of the masses."

~ Albert Einstein  

"To say that subjects in general are not proper judges (of the law)
when their governors oppress them and play the tyrant, and when they
defend their rights ...is as great a treason as ever a man uttered.
Tis treason not against one single man, but against the state - against
the whole body politic; tis treason against mankind; tis treason
against Common sense; tis treason against God; And this impious
principle lays the foundation for justifying all the tyranny and
oppression that ever any prince was guilty of. The people know for what
end they set up and maintain their governors, and they are the proper
judges when governors execute their trust as they ought to do it."

~ Jonathan Mayhew  

"Love your country, but never trust its government."

~ Robert A. Heinlein  

"Those who created this country chose freedom. With all of its dangers. And do you know the riskiest part of that choice they made? They actually believed that we could be trusted to make up our own minds in the whirl of differing ideas. That we could be trusted to remain free, even when there were very, very seductive voices – taking advantage of our freedom of speech – who were trying to turn this country into the kind of place where the government could tell you what you can and cannot do."

~ Nat Hentoff  

"It seems foolhardy to assume that the armed state will necessarily be benevolent. The American political tradition is, for good or ill, based in large measure on a healthy mistrust of the state."

~ Sanford Levinson  

"Experience hath shewn,
that even under the best forms [of government]
those entrusted with power have, in time,
and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny."

~ Thomas Jefferson