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"There exists a law, not written down anywhere but inborn in our heart; a law that comes to us not by training or custom or reading but from nature itself, if our lives are endangered, any and every method of protecting ourselves is morally right." Cicero
"If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly to be found in democracy, they will be attained when all persons alike share in the government to the utmost." Aristotle
"There can be no daily democracy without daily citizenship." Ralph Nader
"The basis of a democratic state is liberty." Aristotle
"Democracy is when the indigent, and not the men of property, are the rulers." Aristotle
"Democracy's worst fault is that its leaders are likely to reflect the faults and virtues of their constituents." Robert Heinlein
"When a tyrant has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty, and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader." Plato
"The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment." Robert Hutchins
"The people always have some champion whom they set over them and nurse into greatness. This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector." Plato
"One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors." Plato
"Of all of the forms of government...tyranny is the worst...So men flee from tyrants as they would from a cruel beast; nor is it any different to be subject to a tyrant or to a savage beast." Thomas Aquinas
"...When the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person or body, there can be no liberty, because...the same monarch or senate...might enact tyrannical laws to execute them in a tyrannical manner." Montesquieu
"New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common." John Locke
"It is one thing to show a man that he is in error, and another to put him in possession of the truth." John Locke
"Wherever law ends, tyranny begins." John Locke
"The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom." John Locke
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." Voltaire
"If ever time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." Samuel Adams
"Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can." Samuel Adams
"No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him." Thomas Jefferson
"Some other natural rights have not yet entered into any declaration of rights." Thomas Jefferson
A Constitution of Government once changed from freedom can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever." John Adams
"It does not take a majority to prevail...but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men." Samuel Adams
"The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite." Thomas Jefferson
"Experience has shown that even under the best forms (of government) those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny." Francis Bacon
"Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Lord Acton
"Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do." Benjamin Franklin
"The true theory of our Constitution is surely the wisest and best . . . (for) when all government . . . shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another, and will become as . . . oppressive as the government from which we separated." Thomas Jefferson
"The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself." Benjamin Franklin
"Without Justices of the Supreme Court, the Constitution would be a dead letter. Their power is enormous, but it is the power of public opinion. The Justices are all powerful as long as the people respect the law; but they would be impotent against popular neglect or contempt of the law." Alexis de Tocqueville
"We must confine ourselves to the powers described in the Constitution, and the moment we pass it, we take an arbitrary stride towards a despotic Government." James Jackson
"Americans of all ages, all stations in life, and all types of dispositions are forever forming associations...at the head of any new undertaking, where in France you would find the government or in England some territorial magnate, in the United States you are sure to find an association." Alexis de Tocqueville.
"Whenever things are equal, public opinion brings immense weight to bear on every individual. It surrounds, directs, and oppresses him. The basic constitution of society has more to do with this than any political laws." Alexis de Tocqueville
"The power vested in the American courts of justice of pronouncing a statute to be unconstitutional, forms one of the most powerful barriers that have ever been devised against the tyrannies of political assemblies." Alexis de Tocqueville
"Democracy is timelessly human, and timelessness always implies a certain amount of potential youthfulness." Thomas Mann
"Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes." Mahatma Gandhi
"Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one." Thomas Paine
These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph." Thomas Paine
"I fear three newspapers more than a hundred bayonets." Napoleon Bonaparte
"To succeed in politics, it is often necessary to rise above your principles." Anonymous
"I heartily accept the motto, that the government is best which governs the least." Henry David Thoreau
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe." Edmund Burke
"Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action." George Washington
"The court is the law. Courts interpret law. Therefore Courts interpret the Constitution." Chief Justice John Marshall
"What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that its people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." Thomas Jefferson
"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."Thomas Jefferson
"Does the government fear us, or do we fear the government? When the people fear the government, tyranny has found victory. The federal government is our servant, not our master!" Thomas Jefferson
"The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases." Thomas Jefferson
"Virtue & Knowledge are diffused among the People, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great Security." Samuel Adams
"They define a republic to be a government of laws, and not of men." John Adams
"The public cannot be too curious concerning the characters of public men." Samuel Adams
"The Constitution...is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary which they may twist and shape into any form they please." Thomas Jefferson
"Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm." James Madison
"Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter." Thomas Jefferson
"We start with first principles. The Constitution creates a Federal Government of enumerated powers." Chief Justice William Rehnquist
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, it expects what never was and never will be... The people cannot be safe without information. Where the press is free and every man is able to read, all is safe." Thomas Jefferson
"The contest, for all ages, has been to rescue Liberty from the grasp of executive power." Daniel Webster
"The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." James Madison
"The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted." James Madison
"If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy." James Madison
"In Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority." James Madison
"That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves." Thomas Jefferson
"One hundred and seventy-three despots would surely be as oppressive as one...an elective despotism is not the government we fought for." Thomas Jefferson
"Equal rights for all, special privileges for none." Thomas Jefferson
"To be prepared for war is one of the most effective ways of preserving peace." George Washington
"Government is not reason: it is not eloquence; it is a force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." George Washington
"That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience, or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable Citizens, from keeping their own arms." Samuel Adams
"If you love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." Samuel Adams
"They that give up liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty or safety." Benjamin Franklin
"The constitution preserves the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust their people with arms." James Madison
"In Republics, the great danger is that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority." James Madison
"Men love power. Give all power to the many and they will oppress the few. Give all power to the few, they will oppress the many." Alexander Hamilton
"The way to secure liberty is to place it in the peoples' hands, that is, to give them the power at all times to defend it in the legislature and in the courts of justice." John Adams
"It is of great importance in a republic not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part." James Madison
"If the majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure." James Madison
"But what is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary." James Madison
"In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." James Madison
"...We may define a republic to be ... a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period, or during good behavior." James Madison
"...The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and the judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny...” James Madison
“Energy in the executive is a leading character in the definition of good government. It is essential to the protection of the community against foreign attacks; it is not less essential to the steady administration of the laws; to the protection of property, to the security of liberty against the enterprises and assaults of ambition, of faction, and anarchy...” Alexander Hamilton
“While the constitution continues to be read, and its principles known, the states, must, by every rational man, be considered as essential component parts of the union; and therefore the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is totally inadmissible.” Alexander Hamilton
“The judiciary on the contrary has no influence over the sword or the purse, no direction either of the strength or of the wealth of society, and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither Force nor Will, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgment.” Alexander Hamilton
“The people, sir, are a great beast.” Alexander Hamilton
“...In all cases where power is to be conferred, the point first to be decided is whether such a power be necessary to the public good.” James Madison
“The proposed Constitution ... is, in strictness, neither a national nor a federal constitution; but a composition of both.” James Madison
“The safety of the people of America against dangers from foreign force depends not only on their forbearing to give just causes of war to other nations, but also on their placing and continuing themselves in such a situation as not to invite hostility or insult.” John Jay
“Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Declaration of Independence
“The powers of the federal government are enumerated; it can only operate in certain cases; it has legislative powers on defined and limited objects, beyond which it cannot extend its jurisdiction.”James Madison
"The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government." James Madison
“We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.” Benjamin Franklin
“Constitutional democracy, you see, is no romantic notion. It's our defense against ourselves, the one foe who might defeat us.” Bill Moyers
"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
“Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a FEDERAL, and not a NATIONAL constitution.” James Madison
"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!" Patrick Henry
“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!” Benjamin Franklin
“In the next place, the state governments are, by the very theory of the constitution, essential constituent parts of the general government. They can exist without the latter, but the latter cannot exist without them.” Justice Joseph Story
“The strongest democracies flourish from frequent and lively debate, but they endure when people of every background and belief find a way to set aside smaller differences in service of a greater purpose.” Barack Obama
“Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Declaration of Independence
“The people made the Constitution, and the people can unmake it. It is the creature of their own will, and lives only their will.” Justice John Marshall
"As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy." Abraham Lincoln
“Without the Constitution and the Union, we could not have attained the result; but even these are not the primary cause of our great prosperity. There is something back of these, entwining itself more closely about the human heart. That something, is the principle of “Liberty to all” the principle that clears the path for all—gives hope to all—and, by consequence, enterprise [sic], and industry to all.” Abraham Lincoln
“Interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a glorious liberty document.” Frederick Douglas
“The principle on which this country was founded and by which it has always been governed is that Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart; Americanism is not, and never was, a matter of race and ancestry. A good American is one who is loyal to this country and to our creed of liberty and democracy.” Franklin D. Roosevelt
“Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” Winston Churchill
“The only title in our democracy superior to that of President, the title of citizen.” James Earl Carter
“A right is not what someone gives you; it’s what no one can take from you.” Ramsey Clark
“One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society ... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.” Martin Luther King, Jr.
“An American is a person who does things because they haven’t been done before.” Mark Twain
“The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.” Theodore Roosevelt
“America is not like a blanket-one piece of unbroken cloth, the same color, the same texture, the same size. America is more like a quilt-many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven and held together by a common thread.” Jesse Jackson
“The only foes that threaten America are the enemies at home, and these are ignorance, superstition, and incompetence.” Elbert Hubbard
“Free speech is not to be regulated like diseased cattle and impure butter. The audience that hissed yesterday may applaud today, even for the same performance.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence beyond the reach of government.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The purpose that brought the fourteenth amendment into being was equality before the law, and equality, not separation, was written into the law.” Robert Bork
“The First Amendment was designed to protect offensive speech, because nobody ever tries to ban the other kind.” Mike Goodwin
“Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of it. The history of liberty is a history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of limitations of governmental power, not the increase of it.” Woodrow Wilson
“The question of the relation of the states to the federal government is the cardinal question of our constitutional system...It cannot, indeed, be settled by the opinion of any one generation.” Woodrow Wilson
"In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law ... That would lead to anarchy. An individual who breaks a law that his conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law." Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." Martin Luther King, Jr.
"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficial. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"We must remember that a right lost to one is lost to all." William Reece Smith, Jr.
"Whenever men take the law into their own hands, the loser is the law. And when the law loses, freedom languishes." Robert F. Kennedy
"So long as we have enough people in this country willing to fight for their rights, we'll be called a democracy." Roger Baldwin
"In a democracy dissent is an act of faith. Like medicine, the test of its value is not in its taste, but in its effects." J. W. Fulbright
"If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind." John Stuart Mill
"The ballot is stronger than bullets." Joseph Schumpeter
"I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually." James Baldwin
“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country." John F. Kennedy
“There is an old saying that the course of civilization is a race between catastrophe and education. In a democracy such as ours, we must make sure that education wins the race.” John F. Kennedy
“The right to vote is the most basic right without which all others are meaningless...The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice and destroying the terrible wall which imprison men because they are different form other men.” President Lyndon B. Johnson
"There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America." President William J. Clinton
“I often wonder if we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men; when it dies there is no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there it needs no constitution, no laws, no court to save it.” Judge Learned Hand
“At the end of the day, the American people are going to have to decide. No President can decide. No president can pursue a policy for very long without the support and the understanding of the Congress and the American people. That’s been demonstrated over and over again.” Dean Rusk
“The best of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market. That at any rate is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. Jr.
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” Eleanor Roosevelt
“Let me be a free man---free to travel, free to stop, free to work, free to trade where I choose, free to choose my own teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to think and talk and act for myself---and I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty.” Chief Joseph
“The Constitution and the laws are supreme and the Union indissoluble.” Andrew Jackson
“If we do not want to die together in war, we must learn to live together in peace.” Harry S. Truman
“No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.” Ronald Reagan
“Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education.” Franklin D. Roosevelt
“Our constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws, not of men.” Gerald R. Ford
“A free society is a place where it's safe to be unpopular.” Adlai E. Stevenson Jr.
“Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.” Albert Einstein
“If you want to be free, there is but one way; it is to guarantee an equally full measure of liberty to all your neighbors. There is no other.” Carl Schurz
“Patterning your life around others’ opinions is nothing more than slavery.” Lawana Blackwell
“Government is too big and too important to be left to the politicians.” Chester Bowles
“The great thing about democracy is that it gives every voter a chance to do something stupid.” Art Spander
“Censorship reflects a society's lack of confidence in itself. It is the landmark of an authoritarian regime.” Justice Potter Stewart
“The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence beyond the reach of government.” Justice William O. Douglas
“I yield to no one in my earnest hope that the time will come when an 'affirmative action' program is unnecessary and is ...only a relic of the past. Then persons will be regarded as persons, and discrimination of the type we address today will be an ugly feature of history that is instructive but is behind us.” Justice Harry A. Blackmun
"Anonymous pamphlets, leaflets, brochures and even books have played an important role in the progress of mankind. Persecuted groups and sects from time to time throughout history have been able to criticize the oppressive practices and laws either anonymously or not at all... It is plain that anonymity has sometimes been assumed for the most constructive purposes." Justice Hugo L. Black
“Since when have we Americans been expected to bow submissively to authority and speak with awe and reverence to those who represent us?” Justice William O. Douglas
“In view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our Constitution is colorblind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens." Justice John Marshall Harlan
"Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and intelligence of the citizens. T hey fall, when the wise are banished from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people, in order to betray them." Justice Joseph Story
“The mind of a bigot is like the pupil of the eye. The more light you shine on it, the more it will contract.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections." Justice Robert H. Jackson
"It is my belief that there are 'absolutes' in our Bill of Rights, and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what the words meant and meant their prohibitions to be absolutes.” Justice Hugo L. Black
“Capital punishment...treats members of the human race...as objects to be toyed with and discarded.” Justice William J. Brennan
"Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation in office as essential to the preservation of the nation." Justice William O. Douglas
"At the foundation of our civil liberties lies the principle that denies to government officials an exceptional position before the law and which subjects them to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen." Justice Louis Brandeis
"It is fundamental that the great powers of Congress to conduct war and to regulate the Nation's foreign relations are subject to the constitutional requirements of due process. The imperative necessity for safeguarding these rights to procedural due process under the gravest of emergencies has existed throughout our constitutional history, for it is then,
under the pressing exigencies of crisis, that there is the greatest temptation to dispense with fundamental constitutional guarantees which, it is feared, will inhibit governmental action." Justice Arthur Goldberg
“The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.” Justice William O. Douglas
"The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness...They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions, and their sensations. They conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone, the most comprehensive of the rights and the right most valued by civilized men." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"The public welfare demands that constitutional cases must be decided according to the terms of the Constitution itself, and not according to judges’ views of fairness, reasonableness, or justice." Justice Hugo L. Black
“Democracy substitutes self-restraint for external restraint. It is more difficult to maintain than to achieve.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"A people who extend civil liberties only to preferred groups start down the path either to dictatorship of the right or the left." Justice William O. Douglas
"It is not the function of our Government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the Government from falling into error." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“If err we must, let us err on the side of tolerance.” Justice Felix Frankfurter
“Men have discovered no technique for long preserving free government except that the executive be under the law.” Justice Robert H. Jackson
“If facts are changing, law cannot be static.” Justice Felix Frankfurter
"Those who won our independence believed that the final end of the State was to make men free to develop their faculties... They valued liberty both as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty." Justice Louis Brandeis
“If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other, it is the principle of free thought--not free thought for those who agree with us, but freedom for the thought we hate.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"Our forefathers found the evils of free thinking more to be endured than the evils of inquest or suppression. This is because thoughtful, bold and independent minds are essential to the wise, and considered self-government." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedoms.” Justice William O. Douglas
"The price of freedom of religion, or of speech, or of the press, is that we must put up with, and even pay for, a good deal of rubbish." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“The very reason for the First Amendment is to make the people of this country free to think, speak, write and worship as they wish, not as the Government commands.” Justice Hugo L. Black
“If the First Amendment means anything, it means that a state has no business telling a man, sitting in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch. Our whole constitutional heritage rebels at the thought of giving government the power to control men's minds.” Justice Thurgood Marshall
"A function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute. It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it indices a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with things as they are, or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. It may strike at prejudices and preconceptions and have profound unsettling effects as it presses for understanding." Justice Potter Stewart
"The censor’s sword pierces deeply into the heart of free expression." Justice Earl Warren
"The greater the importance to safeguarding the community from incitements to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more imperative is the need to preserve the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion." Justice Charles Evans Hughes
“It is not enough to know that the men applying the standard are honorable and devoted men. This is a government of laws, not of men. It is not without significance that most of the provisions of the Bill of Rights are procedural. It is procedure that spells much of the difference between rule by law and rule by whim or caprice.” Justice William O. Douglas
“Most of the things we do, we do for no better reason than that our fathers have done them or our neighbors do them, and the same is true of a larger part than what we suspect of what we think.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"Ideas are indeed the most dangerous weapons in the world. Our ideas of freedom are the most powerful political weapons man has ever forged." Justice William O. Douglas
"This is a court of law, young man, not a court of justice." Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.” Justice John Marshall
“Liberty implies the absence of arbitrary restraint, not immunity from reasonable regulations.” Justice Charles Evans Hughes
“The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"There can be no assumption that today’s majority is “right” and the Amish or others like them are “wrong.” A way of life that is odd or even erratic but interferes with no right or interests of others is not to be condemned because it is different." Justice Warren E. Burger
"Ultimately all the questions boil down to one -Whether we as a people will try fearfully and futilely to preserve democracy by adopting totalitarian methods, or whether in accordance with our traditions, and our Constitution we will have the confidence and courage to be free." Justice Hugo L. Black
"Our institutions were not devised to bring about uniformity of opinion; if they had, we might well abandon hope. It is important to remember, as has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is that under its shelter many different types of life and character and opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.” Justice Charles Evans Hughes
“As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there's a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we must be aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and the people, equally in war and in peace.” Justice David Davis
“This government can exercise only the powers granted to it.” Justice John Marshall
“The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people.” Justice Hugo L. Black
“We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights-older than our political parties, older than our school system.” Justice William O. Douglas
“If discrimination based on race is constitutionally permissible when those who hold the reins can come up with "compelling" reasons to justify it, then constitutional guarantees acquire an accordion like quality.” Justice William O. Douglas
"The real rulers in Washington are invisible and exercise power from behind the scenes." Justice Felix Frankfurter
"The right to defy an unconstitutional statute is basic in our scheme. Even when an ordinance requires a permit to make a speech, to deliver a sermon, to picket, to parade, or to assemble, it need not be honored when it's invalid on its face." Justice Potter Stewart
“Tact, respect, and generosity toward variant views will always commend themselves to those charged with the duties of legislation, so as to achieve a maximum of good will and to require a minimum of unwilling submission to a general law.” Justice Frankfurter
"We cannot say that a failure, because of religious scruples to assume a particular physical position and to repeat the words of a patriotic formula, creates a grave danger to the nation. Such a statutory exaction is a form of a test oath, and a test oath has always been abhorrent in the United States." Justice Hugo L. Black
"The priceless heritage of our society is the unrestricted constitutional right of each member to think as he will. Thought control is a copyright of totalitarianism, and we have no claim to it." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen's constitutional rights, it acts lawlessly and the citizen can take matters into his own hands and proceed on the basis that such a law is no law at all.” Justice William O. Douglas
"The great and invigorating influences in American life have been the unorthodox: the people who challenge an existing institution or way of life, or say and do things that make people think." Justice William O. Douglas
“A body of law is more rational and more civilized when every rule it contains is referred articulately and definitely to an end which it subserves and the grounds for desiring that end are stated, or are ready to be stated in words.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
“It is desirable that criminals should be detected, and to that end all available evidence should be used. We have to choose, and for my part, I think it less evil that some criminals should escape than that the government should play an ignoble part.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanging, it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and time in which it is used.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
“It is confidence in the men and women who administer the judicial system that is the true backbone of the rule of law. “ Justice John Paul Stevens
“The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence beyond the reach of government.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The advice of elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
“In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race. And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat them differently.” Justice Harry A. Blackmun
"Anonymous pamphlets, leaflets, brochures and even books have played an important role in the progress of mankind. Persecuted groups and sects from time to time throughout history have been able to criticize the oppressive practices and laws either anonymously or not at all. It is plain that anonymity has sometimes been assumed for the most constructive purposes." Justice Hugo L. Black
“Since when have we Americans been expected to bow submissively to authority and speak with awe and reverence to those who represent us?” Justice William O. Douglas
“Great cases like hard cases make bad law.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and intelligence of the citizens. They fall, when the wise are banished from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people, in order to betray them." Justice Joseph Story
"Big Brother in the form of an increasingly powerful government and in an increasingly powerful private sector will pile the records high with reasons why privacy should give way to national security, to law and order, to efficiency of operation, to scientific advancement and the like." Justice William O. Douglas
“Deep-seated preferences cannot be argued about.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"The First and Fourteenth Amendments say that Congress and the States shall make "no law" which abridges freedom of speech or of the press. In order to sanction a system of censorship I would have to say that "no law" does not mean what it says, that "no law" is qualified to mean "some" laws. I cannot take this step." Justice William O. Douglas
“Censorship reflects a society's lack of confidence in itself. It is the landmark of an authoritarian regime..." Justice Potter Stewart
"A nation's success or failure in achieving democracy is judged in part by how well it responds to those at the bottom and the margins of the social order... The very problems that democratic change brings -- social tension, heightened expectations, and political unrest -- are also strengths. Discord is a sign of progress afoot; unease is an indication that a society has let go of what it knows and is working out something better and new." Justice Sandra Day O'Connor
“The character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation in office as essential to the preservation of the nation." Justice William O. Douglas
"The First Amendment has erected a wall between Church and State. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach." Justice Hugo L. Black
“This freedom was first in the Bill of Rights. It was set forth in absolute terms, and its strength is its rigidity. The First Amendment's purpose was to create a complete and permanent separation of the spheres of religious activity and civil authority by comprehensively forbidding every form of public aid or support for religion.” Tom Clark
"From the standpoint of freedom of speech and the press, it is enough to point out that the state has no legitimate interest in protecting any or all religions from views distasteful to them...It is not the business of government to suppress real or imagined attacks upon a particular religious doctrine." Tom Clark
"At the foundation of our civil liberties lies the principle that denies to government officials an exceptional position before the law and which subjects them to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change.” They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty." Justice Louis Brandeis
"What finally emerges from the 'clear and present danger' cases is a working principle that the substantive evil must be extremely serious and the degree of imminence extremely high before utterances can be punished... It must be taken as a command of the broadest scope that explicit language, read in the context of a liberty-loving society, will allow." Justice Hugo L. Black
“To obtain a just compromise, concession must not only be mutual--it must be equal also....There can be no hope that either will yield more than it gets in return.” Justice John Marshall
“If the provisions of the Constitution be not upheld when they pinch as well as when they comfort, they may as well be abandoned.” Justice Charles Evan Hughes
“At the constitutional level where we work, 90 percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for supporting our predilections.” Justice William O. Douglas
"The layman's constitutional view is that what he likes is constitutional and that which he doesn't like is unconstitutional." Justice Hugo L. Black
"I believe the Court has no power to add to or subtract from the procedures set forth by the founders...I shall not at any time surrender my belief that the document itself should be our guide, not our own concept of what is fair, decent, and right." Justice Hugo L. Black
“We who have the final word can speak softly or angrily. We can seek to challenge and annoy, as we need not stay docile and quiet.” Justice William O. Douglas
“We must distinguish between the sound certainty and the sham, between what is gold and what is tinsel; and then, when certainty is attained, we must remember that it is not the only good, that we can buy it at too high a price.” Justice Benjamin Cardozo
"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"A people who extend civil liberties only to preferred groups start down the path either to dictatorship of the right or the left." Justice William O. Douglas
“A state government may adopt race-conscious programs if the purpose of such programs is to remove the disparate racial impact its actions might otherwise have and if there is reason to believe that the disparate impact is itself the product of past discrimination, whether its own or that of society at large.” Justice William Brennan
“To have doubted one's own first principles are the mark of a civilized man.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"While the collateral consequences of drugs such as cocaine are indisputably severe, they are not unlike those which flow from the misuse of other, legal, substances." Justice Byron R. White
“The legislature must be free to choose unless government is to be rendered impotent. The Fourteenth amendment has no more imbedded in the Constitution our preference for some particular set of economic beliefs, than it has adopted, in the name of liberty, the system of theology, which we happen to approve.” Justice Harlan Stone
"The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances. No doctrine, involving more pernicious consequences, was ever invented by the wit of man than that any of its provisions can be suspended during any of the great exigencies of government. Such a doctrine leads directly to anarchy or despotism, but the theory of necessity on which it is based is false; for the government, within the Constitution, has all the powers granted to it, which are necessary to preserve its existence; as has been happily proved by the result of the great effort to throw off its just authority." Justice David Davis
"Emergency does not create power. Emergency does not increase granted power or remove or diminish the restrictions imposed upon power granted or reserved. The Constitution was adopted in a period of grave emergency. Its grants of power to the federal government and its limitations of the power of the States were determined in the light of emergency, and they are not altered by emergency." Justice Charles Evans Hughes
“The guarantee of equal protection cannot mean one thing when applied to one individual and something else when applied to a person of another color. If both are not accorded the same protection, then it is not equal.” Justice Lewis F. Powell, Jr.
"It is not the function of our Government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the Government from falling into error." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“If err we must, let us err on the side of tolerance.” Justice Felix Frankfurter
“Men have discovered no technique for long preserving free government except that the executive be under the law.” Justice Robert H. Jackson
“It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system, that a single courageous State may if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory, and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.” Justice Louis Brandeis
“If facts are changing, law cannot be static.” Justice Felix Frankfurter
"Those who won our independence believed that the final end of the State was to make men free to develop their faculties...They valued liberty both as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"The government must pursue a course of complete neutrality toward religion." Justice John Paul Stevens
“To rely on a tidy formula for the easy determination of what is a fundamental right for purpose of legal enforcement may satisfy a longing for certainty but ignores the movements of a free society.” Justice Felix Frankfurter
“If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought--not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought we hate.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"Our forefathers found the evils of free thinking more to be endured than the evils of inquest or suppression. This is because thoughtful, bold and independent minds are essential to the wise and considered self-government." Justice Robert H. Jackson
"Freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment....I think that we should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“The very reason for the First Amendment is to make the people of this country free to think, speak, write and worship as they wish, not as the Government commands.” Justice Hugo L. Black
“If there is a bedrock principle of the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable." Justice William J. Brennan
“Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burned women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fear.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"Freedom of expression is the well-spring of our civilization...The history of civilization is in considerable measure the displacement of error which once held sway as official truth by beliefs which in turn have yielded to other truths. Therefore the liberty of man to search for truth ought not to be fettered, no matter what orthodoxies he may challenge." Justice Felix Frankfurter
"The struggle is always between the individual and his sacred right to express himself and...the power structure that seeks conformity, suppression and obedience." Justice William O. Douglas
"The constitutional right of free speech has been declared to be the same in peace and war. In peace, too, men may differ widely as to what loyalty to our country demands, and an intolerant majority, swayed by passion or by fear, may be prone in the future, as it has been in the past, to stamp as disloyal opinions with which it disagrees." Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"The greater the importance to safeguarding the community from incitements to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more imperative is the need to preserve the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion." Justice Charles Evans Hughes
“No generalization is wholly true, not even this one.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“Government is not an exact science.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
“It is not enough to know that the men applying the standard are honorable and devoted men. This is a government of laws, not of men....It is not without significance that most of the provisions of the Bill of Rights are procedural. It is procedure that spells much of the difference between rule by law and rule by whim or caprice.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The best of wages will not compensate for excessively long working hours which undermine heath.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
“History, in illuminating the past, illuminates the present, and in illuminating the present, illuminates the future.” Benjamin Cardozo
"Ideas are indeed the most dangerous weapons in the world.” Our ideas of freedom are the most powerful political weapons man has ever forged." Justice William O. Douglas
“Jury service is a duty as well as a privilege of citizenship; it is a duty that cannot be shirked on a plea of inconvenience or decreased earning power.” Justice Frank Murphy
“Knowledge and timber shouldn't be much used till they are seasoned.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
“A law embodies beliefs that have triumphed in the battle of ideas.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“Common sense often makes good law.” Justice William O. Douglas
“The reward of the general is not a bigger tent, but command.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
“Liberty implies the absence of arbitrary restraint, not immunity from reasonable regulations...” Justice Charles Evans Hughes
"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." Justice Benjamin Cardozo
“The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.”Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"Ultimately all the questions boil down to one -Whether we as a people will try fearfully and futilely to preserve democracy by adopting totalitarian methods, or whether in accordance with our traditions, and our constitution we will have the confidence and courage to be free." Justice Hugo L. Black
“The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people.” Justice Hugo L. Black
“Progress flows only from struggle.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard. It seems trite but necessary to say that the First Amendment to the Constitution was designed to avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings. If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein." Justice Robert H. Jackson
"The right to defy an unconstitutional statute is basic in our scheme. Even when an ordinance requires a permit to make a speech, to deliver a sermon, to picket, to parade, or to assemble, it need not be honored when it's invalid on its face." Justice Potter Stewart
“The world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its great scholars great men.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"I cannot say that our country could have no secret police without becoming totalitarian, but I can say with great conviction that it cannot become totalitarian without a centralized national police." Justice Robert H. Jackson
“Nothing is settled until it is settled right.” Justice Louis D. Brandeis
“Tact, respect, and generosity toward variant views will always commend themselves to those charged with the duties of legislation so as to achieve a maximum of good will and to require a minimum of unwilling submission to a general law.” Justice Frankfurter
"[We] cannot say that a failure, because of religious scruples, to assume a particular physical position and to repeat the words of a patriotic formula creates a grave danger to the nation. Such a statutory exaction is a form of a test oath, and a test oath has always been abhorrent in the United States." Justice Hugo Black
“General propositions do not decide concrete cases. The decision will depend on a judgment or intuition more subtle than any articulate major premise.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
{Federalism} “We start with first principles. The Constitution creates a Federal Government of enumerated powers.” Justice William Rehnquist
[Justices do not have the right to declare] "a law unconstitutional simply because they considered a law unwise." [The court] is not to decide whether the view taken by the legislature is a wise view, but whether a body of men could reasonably hold such a view." Justice Brandeis
"The great and invigorating influences in American life have been the unorthodox: the people who challenge an existing institution or way of life, or say and do things that make people think." Justice William O. Douglas
“A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanging, it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and time in which it is used.” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
“The logic of words should yield to the logic of realities.” Justice Brandeis
“It is the part of wisdom, particularly for judges, not to be victimized by words.” Justice Frankfurter
“Sometimes it's hard to give meaning to a constitutional term in a particular case. But you don't look to your own values and beliefs. You look outside yourself to other sources. This is the basis for? You know, judges wear black robes because it doesn't matter who they are as individuals. That's not going to shape their decision. It's their understanding of the law that will shape their decisions.” Chief Justice Roberts
“The right to privacy is protected under the Constitution in various ways.” Chief Justice Roberts
“This body and legislative bodies in the states are protectors of the people's rights.” Chief Justice Roberts
{Federalism} “A national government is a government of the people of a single state or nation, united as a community by what is termed the “social compact,’ and possessing complete and perfect supremacy over persons and things, so far as they can be made the lawful objects of civil government. A federal government is distinguished from a national government by its being the government of a community of independent and sovereign states, united by compact.” (Black’s Law Dictionary)