Liberty Quotes - Page 16

• If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

  George Orwell

  Inspirational, Life, Freedom

  "The Freedom of the Press" (1945)

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• The laws of man may bind him in chains or may put him to death, but they never can make him wise, virtuous, or happy.

  John Quincy Adams

  Wise, Wisdom, Men

  John Quincy Adams (1848). “Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son, on the Bible and Its Teachings”, p.23

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• The high rate of unemployment among teenagers, and especially black teenagers, is both a scandal and a serious source of social unrest. Yet it is largely a result of minimum wage laws. We regard the minimum wage law as one of the most, if not the most, anti-black laws on the statute books.

  Milton Friedman

  Teenager, Book, Social Unrest

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• Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wisdom, Law, Tyrants

  Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.224, Cambridge University Press

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• Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

  George Bernard Shaw

  Inspirational, Freedom, Fear

  Man and Superman (1903) "Maxims for Revolutionists: Liberty and Equality"

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• The ideal Government of all reflective men, from Aristotle onward, is one which lets the individual alone - one which barely escapes being no government at all.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, Libertarian, Intriguing

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.146, Vintage

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• Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined.

  Patrick Henry

  Giving Up, 4th Of July, Jealous

  Virginia's U.S. Constitution ratification convention, June 5, 1788.

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• Without Virtue there can be no liberty

  Benjamin Rush

  Freedom, Morality, Virtue

  Benjamin Rush (1806). “Essays, Literary, Moral and Philosophical ...”, p.8

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• No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session.

  Mark Twain

  Life, Trust, Freedom

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• ... and in thinking of my life, I almost forgot my liberty.

  Frederick Douglass

  Thinking

  Frederick Douglass (2016). “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass”, p.159, Frederick Douglass

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• Most of the major ills of the world have been caused by well-meaning people who ignored the principle of individual freedom, except as applied to themselves, and who were obsessed with fanatical zeal to improve the lot of mankind.

  Henry Grady Weaver

  Freedom, People, Principles

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• Look not to the politicians; look to yourselves.

  Richard Cobden

  Looks, Libertarian, Politician

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• ...The Bill of Rights is a literal and absolute document. The First Amendment doesn't say you have a right to speak out unless the government has a 'compelling interest' in censoring the Internet. The Second Amendment doesn't say you have the right to keep and bear arms until some madman plants a bomb. The Fourth Amendment doesn't say you have the right to be secure from search and seizure unless some FBI agent thinks you fit the profile of a terrorist. The government has no right to interfere with any of these freedoms under any circumstances.

  Harry Browne

  Thinking, Fbi Agents, Rights

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• Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it.

  Learned Hand

  Love, Freedom, Hate

  "The Spirit of Liberty" (speech), New York, N.Y., 21 May 1944

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• The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves.

  Donald James

  Self, Perfect, Historical

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• The politician attempts to remedy the evil by increasing the very thing that caused the evil in the first place: legal plunder.

  Frederic Bastiat

  Evil, Libertarian, Firsts

  Frederic Bastiat (2006). “The Law”, p.27, Filiquarian Publishing, LLC.

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• If men were angels, no government would be necessary.

  James Madison

  Adversity, Angel, Men

  The Federalist no. 51 (1788)

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• I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.

  Ronald Reagan

  Independent, Men, Law

  Ronald Reagan, Michael Reagan (2016). “The Last Best Hope: The Greatest Speeches of Ronald Reagan”, p.226, Humanix Books

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• Have you ever noticed how statists are constantly "reforming" their own handiwork? Education reform. Health-care reform. Welfare reform. Tax reform. The very fact that they're always busy "reforming" is an implicit admission that they didn't get it right the first 50 times.

  Lawrence Reed

  Welfare Reform, Care, Libertarian

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  Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.

  Groucho Marx

  Art, Freedom, Political Will

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  Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Patriotic, Equality, Differences

  "Discours prononcé à l'assemblée constituante le 12 Septembre 1848 sur la question du droit au travail". Oeuvres complètes, Volume IX, p. 546, 1866.

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• Today, we need a nation of Minutemen, citizens who are not only prepared to take arms, but citizens who regard the preservation of freedom as the basic purpose of their daily life and who are willing to consciously work and sacrifice for that freedom.

  John F. Kennedy

  Freedom, Sacrifice, Gun

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• Freedom is the oxygen of the soul.

  Moshe Dayan

  Freedom, 4th Of July, Patriotic

  Moshe Dayan (1992). “Moshe Dayan: Story of My Life”, Da Capo Press

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• Once we roared like lions for liberty; now we bleat like sheep for security! The solution for America's problem is not in terms of big government, but it is in big men over whom nobody stands in control but God.

  Norman Vincent Peale

  God, Men, America

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• People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.

  Soren Kierkegaard

  Freedom, Thinking, People

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