Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quoteShare via Email Print this Page Daily Quotes Archives2024-05-30 May 30, 2024All bad precedents began as justifiable measures.~ Gaius Julius CaesarBy placing discretion in the hands of an official to grant or deny a license, such a statute creates a threat of censorship that by its very existence chills free speech.~ Harry A. BlackmunA free press stands as one of the great interpreters between the government and the people. To allow it to be fettered is to fetter ourselves.~ Justice George Sutherland May 29, 2024Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There's no better rule.~ Charles DickensJudges are but men, and are swayed like other men by vehement prejudices. This is corruption in reality, give it whatever other name you please.~ David Dudley Field, IIWe are more especially called upon to maintain the principles of free discussion in case of unpopular sentiments or persons, as in no other case will any effort to maintain them be needed.~ Edward Beecher May 28, 2024A theory deeply etched in our law [is that] a free society prefers to punish the few who abuse the rights of free speech after they break the law rather than to throttle them and all others beforehand.~ Justice Clarence ThomasIf there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the process of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.~ Justice Louis D. BrandeisThe very aim and end of our institutions is just this: that we may think what we like and say what we think.~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. May 27, 2024I cannot conceive a rank more honorable, than that which flows from the uncorrupted choice of a brave and free people, the purest source and original fountain of all power.~ George WashingtonYes, we did produce a near-perfect republic. But will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path of destruction.~ Thomas JeffersonWe enjoy freedom and the rule of law on which it depends, not because we deserve it, but because others before us put their lives on the line to defend it.~ Thomas Sowell May 24, 2024Positive laws are tyrannical. One's individual rights -- whether they be life, liberty, or property -- must be sacrificed by the state in order to fulfill the positive rights of another. For example, if housing is considered a "right," then the state will have to confiscate wealth (property) from those who have provided shelter for themselves in order to house those who have not. ... True justice is realized when our lives, and property are secure, and we are free to express our thoughts without fear of retribution. Just laws are negative in nature; they exist to thwart the violation of our natural rights. Government ought to be the collective organization -- that is, the extension -- of the individual's right of self-defense, and its purpose to protect our lives, liberties, and property.~ Mark Da VeeA right is not what someone gives you; it's what no one can take from you.~ Ramsey ClarkAmong the natural Rights of the Colonists are these: First, a Right to Life; secondly, to Liberty; thirdly, to Property; together with the Right to support and defend them in the best Manner they can. Those are evident Branches of, rather than Deductions from, the Duty of Self-Preservation, commonly called the first Law of Nature.~ Samuel Adams Previous week's quotes Next week's quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print