Liberty Quotes - Daily Email History

"Protection against government is now not enough to guarantee that a man who has something to say shall have a chance to say it. The owners and managers of the press determine which person, which facts, which version of the facts, and which ideas shall reach the public."

~ Commission On Freedom Of The Press  

"No mighty king, no ambitious emperor, no pope, or prophet ever dreamt
of such an awesome pulpit, so potent a magic wand [television]."

~ Fred W. Friendly  

"It is impossible for ideas to compete in the marketplace
if no forum for their presentation is provided or available."

~ Thomas Mann  

"The censor’s sword pierces deeply into the heart of free expression."

~ Earl Warren  

"No loss by flood and lightning,
no destruction of cities and temples
by hostile forces of nature,
has deprived man
of so many noble lives and impulses
as those which his intolerance
has destroyed."

~ Helen Keller  

"To curtail free expression strikes twice at intellectual freedom, for whoever deprives another of the right to state unpopular views necessarily deprives others of the right to listen to those views."

~ C. Van Woodward  

"Our major mistakes have not been the result of democracy, but of the erosion of democracy made possible by the mass media’s manipulation of public opinion."

~ Robert Cirino  

"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  

"I think that the influence towards suppression of minority views – towards orthodoxy in thinking about public issues – has been more subconscious than unconscious, stemming to a very great extent from the tendency of Americans to conform…not to deviate or depart from an orthodox point of view."

~ William O. Douglas

"The body of People may with Respect resist intolerable Tyranny."

~ John Locke  

"Protection, therefore, against the tyranny
of the magistrate is not enough;
there needs protection against the tyranny
of the prevailing opinion and feeling,
against the tendency of society to impose,
by other means than civil penalties,
its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct
on those who dissent from them."

~ John Stuart Mill  

"Nobody should be compelled to respect an ideology that doesn’t respect them."

~ Pat Condell  

"We have no government armed in power capable of contending with human
passions unbridled by morality and religion. Our Constitution was made
only for a religious and moral people. It is wholly inadequate for the
government of any other."

~ John Adams  

"...So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men."

~ Voltairine de Cleyre  

"Pity the poor, wretched, timid soul, too faint hearted to resist his oppressors.
He sings the songs of the damned, 'I cannot resist, I have too much to lose,
they might take my property or confiscate my earnings,
what would my family do, how would they survive?'
He hides behind pretended family responsibility, failing to see that
the most glorious legacy that we can bequeath to our posterity is liberty!"

~ W. Vaughn Ellsworth