Liberty famous quotes
Last updated: Sep 5, 2024
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In necessary things, unity; in doubtful things, liberty; in all things, charity.
-- Anne Baxter -
All Politeness is owing to Liberty. We polish one another, and rub off our Corners and rough Sides by a sort of amicable Collision. To restrain this, is inevitably to bring a Rust upon Mens Understandings.
-- Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 10th Earl of Shaftesbury -
Self-imposed limits on sovereign power can disarm mistrust, but provide no guarantee of liberty and property beyond those afforded by the balance between state and private force.
-- Anthony de Jasay -
At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.
-- Anthony Kennedy -
When a juvenile commits a heinous crime, the State can exact forfeiture of some of the most basic liberties, but the State cannot extinguish his life and his potential to attain a mature understanding of his own humanity.
-- Anthony Kennedy -
There is no liberty except the liberty of some one making his way towards something. Such a man can be set free if you will teach him the meaning of thirst, and how to trace a path to a well. Only then will he embark upon a course of action that will not be without significance. You could not liberate a stone if there were no law of gravity - for where will the stone go, once it is quarried?
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery -
A Bill of Rights that means what the majority wants it to mean is worthless.
-- Antonin Scalia -
There is nothing new in the realization that the Constitution sometimes insulates the criminality of a few in order to protect the privacy of us all.
-- Antonin Scalia -
Once you permit those who are convinced of their own superior rightness to censor and silence and suppress those who hold contrary opinions, just at that moment the citadel has been surrendered.
-- Archibald MacLeish -
We are as great as our belief in human liberty - no greater. And our belief in human liberty is only ours when it is larger than ourselves.
-- Archibald MacLeish -
He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.
-- Aristotle -
Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved.
-- Aristotle -
One of the least impressive liberties is the liberty to starve. This particular liberty is freely accorded to authors.
-- Arnold Goodman, Baron Goodman -
The highest political buzz word is not liberty, equality, fraternity or solidarity; it is service.
-- Arthur Hugh Clough -
In every man there is an instinctive and passionate reaction if his person or liberty is attacked.
-- Arthur Keith -
The proper balance between individual liberty and central authority is a very ancient problem.
-- Arthur Keith -
Few of us can easily surrender our belief that society must somehow make sense. The thought that the State has lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. And so the evidence has to be internally denied.
-- Arthur Miller -
Martyrdom has always been a proof of the intensity, never of the correctness of a belief.
-- Arthur Schnitzler -
Every nation ridicules other nations, and all are right.
-- Arthur Schopenhauer -
It's not exactly under the radar, but when I'm in London, I love to visit Liberty. It's my favorite department store, and they have a room entirely dedicated to chocolate and truffles.
-- Ashley Madekwe -
As an actor, I think it's always important to separate yourself from your characters because, when you include yourself in a character, you're taking a liberty that you don't really have unless you're life is that incredibly close to the character.
-- Ashley Rickards -
Christianity is the enemy of liberty and civilization.
-- August Bebel -
Free speech is the bedrock of liberty and a free society. And yes, it includes the right to blaspheme and offend.
-- Ayaan Hirsi Ali -
The uncontested absurdities of today are the accepted slogans of tomorrow.
-- Ayn Rand -
The right to vote is a consequence, not a primary cause, of a free social system - and its value depends on the constitutional structure implementing and strictly delimiting the voters' power; unlimited majority rule is an instance of the principle of tyranny.
-- Ayn Rand -
In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win. In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit.
-- Ayn Rand -
To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion.
-- Ayn Rand -
Individual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has no right to vote away the rights of a minority.
-- Ayn Rand -
The difference between a welfare state and a totalitarian state is a matter of time.
-- Ayn Rand -
Socialism is the doctrine that man has no right to exist for his own sake, that his life and his work do not belong to him, but belong to society, that the only justification of his existence is his service to society, and that society may dispose of him in any way it pleases for the sake of whatever it deems to be its own tribal, collective good.
-- Ayn Rand -
The Argument from Intimidation is a confession of intellectual impotence.
-- Ayn Rand -
We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality
-- Ayn Rand -
We are now moving towards complete collectivism or socialism, a system under which everybody is enslaved to everybody.
-- Ayn Rand -
It is a free market that makes monopolies impossible.
-- Ayn Rand -
Men have been taught that it is a virtue to agree with others. But the creator is the man who disagrees. Men have been taught that it is a virtue to swim with the current. But the creator is the man who goes against the current. Men have been taught that it is a virtue to stand together. But the creator is the man who stands alone.
-- Ayn Rand -
The [U.S.] Constitution is a limitation on the government, not on private individuals ... it does not prescribe the conduct of private individuals, only the conduct of the government ... it is not a charter for government power, but a charter of the citizen's protection against the government.
-- Ayn Rand -
What is the basic, the essential, the crucial principle that differentiates freedom from slavery? It is the principle of voluntary action versus physical coercion or compulsion.
-- Ayn Rand -
It is true that the welfare-statists are not socialists, that they never advocated or intended the socialization of private property, that they want to 'preserve' private property-with government control of its use and disposal. But that is the fundamental characteristic of fascism.
-- Ayn Rand -
Everyone has the right to make his own decisions, but none has the right to force his decision on others.
-- Ayn Rand -
Capitalism demands the best of every man - his rationality - and rewards him accordingly. It leaves every man free to choose the work he likes, to specialize in it, to trade his product for the products of others, and to go as far on the road of achievement as his ability and ambition will carry him.
-- Ayn Rand -
In a capitalist society, all human relationships are voluntary. Men are free to cooperate or not, to deal with one another or not, as their own individual judgments, convictions and interests dictate.
-- Ayn Rand -
The end does not justify the means. No one's rights can be secured by the violation of the rights of others.
-- Ayn Rand -
All depressions are caused by government interference and the cure is always offered to take more of the poison that caused the disaster. Depressions are not the result of a free economy.
-- Ayn Rand -
The degree of a country's freedom is the degree of its prosperity.
-- Ayn Rand -
Whoever claims the right to redistribute the wealth produced by others is claiming the right to treat human beings as chattel.
-- Ayn Rand -
A society that robs an individual of the product of his effort ... is not strictly speaking a society, but a mob held together by institutionalized gang violence.
-- Ayn Rand -
The government was set to protect man from criminals, and the Constitution was written to protect man from the government.
-- Ayn Rand -
I like the religion that teaches liberty, equality and fraternity.
-- B. R. Ambedkar -
What are we having this liberty for? We are having this liberty in order to reform our social system, which is full of inequality, discrimination and other things, which conflict with our fundamental rights.
-- B. R. Ambedkar -
America stands for individual liberty, but that means an ordered liberty.
-- Bainbridge Colby -
A liberty subject to law and subordinate to the common welfare.
-- Bainbridge Colby -
In Texas, we hold very dear to intrusions against our personal liberty. We fight very hard against that.
-- Barack Obama -
Let us remember that we can do these things not just because of wealth or power, but because of who we are: one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
-- Barack Obama -
The same liberty that protects me also protects members of the Mafia.
-- Barbara Amiel -
When virtue is at liberty, so to some extent is vice.
-- Barbara Amiel -
All share complicity in the destruction of that much under-rated phenomenon called liberty.
-- Barbara Amiel -
I have the impression that when we talk so confidently of liberty, we are unaware of the awful ... servitude of poverty when means are so small that there is literally no choice at all ...
-- Barbara Ward, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth -
A nation may lose its liberties in a day and not miss them in a century.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
When the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty; because apprehensions may arise, lest the same monarch or senate should enact tyrannical laws, to execute them in a tyrannical manner.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
When the [law making] and [law enforcement] powers are united in the same person... there can be no liberty.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
We ought to be very cautious and circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
Political liberty is to be found only in moderate governments.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
-- Baron de Montesquieu -
Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyrannies. Absolute power does corrupt, and those who seek it must be suspect and must be opposed.
-- Barry Goldwater -
Extremism in defense of Liberty is no vice
-- Barry Goldwater -
I say further that for this great legislative body to ignore the Constitution and the fundamental concepts of our governmental system is to act in a manner which could ultimately destroy the freedom of all American citizens, including the freedoms of the very persons whose feelings and whose liberties are the major subject of this legislation.
-- Barry Goldwater -
Government should stay the hell out of people's business.
-- Barry Goldwater -
There's no greater service to this country than the defense of its freedom.
-- Barry Goldwater -
Throughout history, government has proved to be the chief instrument for thwarting man's liberty.
-- Barry Goldwater -
Never is liberty more easily lost than when we think we are defending it.
-- Ben Chifley -
When the United States aligns with dictatorships and totalitarian regimes, it compromises the basic democratic principles of its foundation - namely, life, liberty and justice for all.
-- Benazir Bhutto -
The great ideals of liberty and equality are preserved against the assaults of opportunism, the expediency of the passing hour, the erosion of small encroachments, the scorn and derision of those who have no patience with general principles.
-- Benjamin Cardozo -
We, today, stand on the shoulders of our predecessors who have gone before us. We, as their successors, must catch the torch of freedom and liberty passed on to us by our ancestors. We cannot lose in this battle.
-- Benjamin E. Mays -
I am not unconscious of the persuasive power exerted by these considerations to drag men along in the current; but I am not at liberty to travel that road.
-- Benjamin F. Wade -
Security without liberty is called prison.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Content makes poor men rich; discontent makes rich men poor.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Sell not virtue to purchase wealth, nor liberty to purchase power.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
It would be thought a hard government that should tax its people one tenth part.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Those Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security Deserve Neither.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Those who would trade in their freedom for their protection deserve neither.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Those who give up their liberty for more security neither deserve liberty nor security.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Admiration is the daughter of ignorance.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
A place for everything, everything in its place.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Creditors have better memories than debtors.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Each year one vicious habit discarded, in time might make the worst of us good.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
He does not possess wealth; it possesses him.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
He that composes himself is wiser than he that composes a book.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Those who would give up liberty for safety deserve neither.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
To whom you betray your secret you sell your liberty.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Tis a common observation here that our cause is the cause of all mankind, and that we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
People willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both.
-- Benjamin Franklin -
Distrust and caution are the parents of security.
-- Benjamin Franklin
