If by the mere force of numbers a majority should deprive a minority of any clearly written constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of view, justify revolution—certainly would if such a right were a vital one.

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Early in life I have noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as heroes of imaginary victories; and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various “party lines.”

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!

There is a class of colored people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs — partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.

Familiarize yourselves with the chains of bondage and you prepare your own limbs to wear them. Accustomed to trample on the rights of others, you have lost the genius of your own independence and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises among you.

The right to free speech is more important than the content of the speech.

Our task must be to free ourselves…by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty.

What light is to the eyes - what air is to the lungs - what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man.

Freedom is to be free from restraint and violence from others.

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to allow his vision wherever it takes him.

Man is a mental being, and to know this is the first step on the road to freedom, for as long as you believe yourself to be primarily physical, you will remain in bondage, that is to say, to your own habits of thought, for there is no other bondage.

Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most impressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be saturated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

One man thinks himself the master of others but remains more of a slave than they are.

Either you will control your government, or government will control you.

In order to enjoy the inestimable benefits that the liberty of the press ensures, it is necessary to submit to the inevitable evils that it creates.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore, send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.

The welfare of the people has always been the alibi of tyrants.

Civil disobedience becomes a sacred duty when the state becomes lawless or corrupt.

The period is now arrived, in which either they or we must change our sentiments, or one or both must fall.

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.

I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample underfoot. Men are no superior by reason of the accidents of race and color. The are superior who have the best heart—the best brain.

Some people are so used to special treatment that equal treatment is considered to be discrimination.

You find out the necessity of Liberty as you find out the necessity of air—by not having enough of it.

When one remains silent in the face of oppression, one is on the side of the oppressor.

Why has government been instituted? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason & justice without constraint.

If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly two be found in democracy, they will be best attained when all persons alike share in the government to the utmost.

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act. . . . Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon the definition of liberty.

Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what they are going to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.