Quotes About Liberty

The tree of liberty needs to be watered from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

to stay out as long as I like. But

Freedom is not enough.

In the ensuing debate Madison declared that "opinions are not the objects of legislation," and he worried aloud, "How far will this go? It may extend to the liberty of speech and of the press." Finally,

common defense, security of liberty, and general welfare.'"7

Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect," Madison told Bradford, writing with the authority of a man who knew firsthand the price of being bound to a received viewpoint—and the liberation of breaking free.

To deny James an education was attacking principles of liberty and equality upon the only ground which it ought to be supported and equality of rights. If James could not go to school, how could he hope to equip himself to earn a living?

America will not wear chains while her daughters are virtuous, but corrupt their morals by a general depravity, believe me sir a state or nation is undone. Was not Adam safe while Eve was innocent?

The only security men can have for their political liberty, consists in keeping their money in their own pockets.

There was no difference of principle—but only of degree—between the slavery they boast they have abolished, and the slavery they were fighting to preserve; for all restraints upon men's natural liberty, not necessary for the simple maintenance of justice, are of the nature of slavery, and differ from each other only in degree.

But this tacit understanding (admitting it to exist) cannot at all justify the conclusion drawn from it. A tacit understanding between A, B, and C, that they will, by ballot, depute D as their agent, to deprive me of my property, liberty, or life, cannot at all authorize D to do so. He is none the less a robber, tyrant, and murderer, because he claims to act as their agent, than he would be if he avowedly acted on his own responsibility alone.

there is no difference…between political and chattel slavery. The former, no less than the latter, denies a man's ownership of himself and the products of his labor; and asserts that other men may own him, and dispose of him and his property, for their uses, and at their pleasure."

Personal liberty is the paramount essential to human dignity and human happiness.

My people are going to learn the principles of democracy the dictates of truth and the teachings of science. Superstition must go. Let them worship as they will, every man can follow his own conscience provided it does not interfere with sane reason or bid him act against the liberty of his fellow men.

Hosiah Lister, now dead, rec'd his freedom." Consider, then, the full measure of my sadness, reading this inscription; not merely for Hosiah Lister, but for all of us, consider the dear cost of liberty in a world so hostile, so teeming with enemies and opportunists, that one could not become free without casting aside all casualty, all choice, all will, all identity; finding freedom only in the spacious blankness of unbeing, the wide plains of nonentity, infinite and still.

Hosiah Lister, now dead, rec'd his freedom.

The British Army and Navy sang a rousing song called "Heart of Oak"; the rebels had writ one to counter it called "The Liberty Song." Both songs blustered of freedom; but both were sung to the same tune. And we, to avoid offense, played the tune without words.

The magic of America is that we're a free and open society with a mixed population. Part of our security is our freedom.

There is much in life that is complicated and beyond our understanding, but the basic principles of human liberty are not so complicated, and if we hold to them, we will find a way to correct our mistakes and set a true course

The story of the Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia holds lessons that still need absorbing. Good guys don't always win, especially when they are divided and less determined than their adversaries. The desire for liberty may be ingrained in every human breast, but so is the potential for complacency, confusion, and cowardice. And losing has a price.

Promoters of free institutions, myself included, love to say that liberty is a universal yearning, but so is the wish to eat.

emancipation from emancipation.

The desire for liberty may be ingrained in every human breast, but so is the potential for complacency, confusion, and cowardice.

A golden cage is still a cage.