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They
[the founders] proclaimed to all the world the
revolutionary doctrine of the divine rights
of the common man. That doctrine has ever since
been the heart of the American faith.
-- Dwight
D. Eisenhower
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The
right to freedom of expression is justified first
of all as the right of an individual purely in his
capacity as an individual. It derives from the widely
accepted premise of Western thought that the proper
end of man is the realization of his character and
potentialities as a human being.
-- Thomas I. Emerson
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They
that can give up essential liberty to obtain a
little temporary safety deserve neither liberty
nor safety.
-- Benjamin Franklin |
The
whole of the Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of
the right of the people at large or considered as
individuals... It establishes some rights of the individual
as unalienable and which consequently, no majority
has a right to deprive them of.
-- Albert Gallatin
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“Rights
that do not flow from duty well performed are
not worth having.”
-- Mohandas K.
Gandhi |
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Civil
liberties victories never stay won, but must be fought
for over and over again.
-- Ira Glasser
Make
men wise, and by that very operation you make them
free. Civil liberty follows as a consequence of this;
no usurped power can stand against the artillery of
opinion.
-- William Godwin
The
greatest right of a civilized person is to be left
alone, unless he does harm to others or is threatening
to do harm to himself.
-- Justice Arthur Joseph Goldberg
I
am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample
underfoot.
-- Horace Greeley
"With
every civil right there has to be a corresponding
civil obligation."
-- Edison Haines
In
a free government, the security for civil rights must
be the same as that for religious rights. It consists
in the one case in the multiplicity of interests,
and in the other in the multiplicity of sects.
-- Alexander Hamilton
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"There
is no contradiction between effective law enforcement
and respect for civil and human rights."
-- Dorothy Height |
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None
of us would trade freedom of expression for
the narrowness of the public censor. America
is a free market for people who have something
to say, and need not fear to say it.
-- Hubert Humphrey
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The
first thing to learn in intercourse with others is
non-interference with their own particular ways of
being happy, provided those ways do not assume to
interfere by violence with ours.
-- William James
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"A
Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled
to against every government, and what no just
government should refuse, or rest on inference."
-- Thomas
Jefferson
Bear
in mind this sacred principle, that though the
will of the majority is in all cases to prevail,
that will to be rightful must be reasonable;
that the minority possess their equal rights,
which equal law must protect, and to violate
would be oppression.
-- Thomas
Jefferson
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"The
best principles of our republic secure to all its
citizens a perfect equality of rights."
-- Thomas Jefferson
By
a declaration of rights, I mean one which shall stipulate
freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom
of commerce against monopolies, trial by juries in
all cases, no suspensions of the habeas corpus, no
standing armies. These are fetters against doing evil
which no honest government should decline.
-- Thomas Jefferson
Whenever
the people are well informed, they can be trusted
with their own government; that whenever things get
so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may
be relied on to set them to rights.
-- Thomas Jefferson
I
would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending
too much liberty than to those attending too small
a degree of it.
-- Thomas Jefferson
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*
If
we make peaceful revolution impossible, we make
violent revolution inevitiable.
-- John
F. Kennedy
“In
giving rights to others which belong to them,
we give rights to ourselves and to our country”
-- John
F. Kennedy
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I
believe in an America where the separation of church
and state is absolute -- where no Catholic prelate
would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how
to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his
parishoners for whom to vote -- where no church or
church school is granted any public funds or political
preference -- and where no man is denied public office
merely because his religion differs from the president
who might appoint him or the people who might elect
him.
-- John F. Kennedy
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The
enlargement of liberty for individual human beings
must be the supreme goal and abiding practice
of any western society.
-- Robert
F. Kennedy |
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"Whatever
career you may choose for yourself - doctor, lawyer,
teacher - let me propose an avocation to be pursued
along with it. Become a dedicated fighter for
civil rights. Make it a central part of your life.
It will make you a better doctor, a better lawyer,
a better teacher. It will enrich your spirit as
nothing else possibly can. It will give you that
rare sense of nobility that can only spring from
love and selflessly helping your fellow man. Make
a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the noble
struggle for human rights. You will make a greater
person of yourself, a greater nation of your country
and a finer world to live in."
-- Martin Luther
King, Jr. |
"When
the government violates the people's rights, insurrection
is, for the people and for each portion of the people,
the most sacred of the rights and the most indispensible
of duties."
-- Marquis De Lafayette
It
is easy to think the State has a lot of different
objects -- military, political, economic, and what
not. But in a way things are much simpler than that.
The State exists simply to promote and to protect
the ordinary happiness of human beings in this life.
A husband and wife chatting over a fire, a couple
of friends having a game of darts in a pub, a man
reading a book in his own room or digging in his own
garden -- that is what the State is there for. And
unless they are helping to increase and prolong and
protect such moments, all the laws, parliaments, armies,
courts, police, economics, etc., are simply a waste
of time.
-- C. S. Lewis
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"The
Cause of civil liberty must not be surrendered
at the end of one, or even one hundred defeats."
-- Abraham Lincoln
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“Don't
interfere with anything in the Constitution.
That must be maintained, for it is the only
safeguard of our liberties.”
-- Abraham Lincoln
To
sin by silence when they should protest makes
cowards of men.”
-- Abraham Lincoln
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I
believe there are more instances of the abridgment
of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent
encroachments of those in power than by violent
and sudden usurpations.
-- James Madison |
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Get
up, stand up, stand up for your rights”
-- Bob Marley
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If
the 1st Amendment means anything, it means that
a state has no business telling a man, sitting
alone in his own house, what books he may read
or what films he may watch.
-- Thurgood
Marshall |
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All
men are by nature born equally free and independent.
-- George Mason
We
came equals into this world, and equals shall
we go out of it.
-- George Mason
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Every
society, all government, and every kind of civil
compact therefore, is or ought to be, calculated
for the general good and safety of the community.
-- George Mason
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*
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 |
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Of
the liberty of conscience in matters of religious
faith, of speech and of the press; of the trial by
jury of the vicinage in civil and criminal cases;
of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus; of the
right to keep and bear arms.... If these rights are
well defined, and secured against encroachment, it
is impossible that government should ever degenerate
into tyranny.
-- James Monroe
The
busybodies have begun to infect American society with
a nasty intolerance -- a zeal to police the private
lives of others and hammer them into standard forms
-- A Nation of Finger Pointers.
-- Lance Morrow
Fascism
should rightly be called Corporatism as it is a merge
of state and corporate power.
-- Benito Mussolini
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The
only way to make sure people you agree with
can speak is to support the rights of people
you don't agree with.
-- Eleanor Holmes
Norton
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We
need not throw away 200 years of American jurisprudence
while we fight terrorism. We need not choose
between our most deeply held values, and keeping
this nation safe.
-- Barack Obama
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For
all men being originally equals, no one by birth
could have a right to set up his own family in
perpetual preference to all others for ever.
-- Thomas Paine |
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I
knew someone had to take the first step and
I made up my mind not to move.
-- Rosa Parks
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All
of us can think of a book... that we hope none of
our children or any other children have taken off
the shelf. But if I have the right to remove that
book from the shelf -- that book I abhor -- then you
also have exactly the same right and so does everyone
else. And then we have no books left on the shelf
for any of us.
-- Katherine Patterson
Demanding
domestic security in times of war invites carelessness
in preserving civil liberties and the right of privacy.
Frequently the people are only too anxious for their
freedoms to be sacrificed on the altar of authoritarianism
thought to be necessary to remain safe and secure.
-- US Representative Ron Paul
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*
Governments
exist to protect the rights of minorities. The
loved and the rich need no protection: they
have many friends and few enemies.
-- Wendell
Phillips
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In
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (December
1948) in most solemn form, the dignity of a person
is acknowledged to all human beings; and as a consequence
there is proclaimed, as a fundamental right, the right
of free movement in search for truth and in the attainment
of moral good and of justice, and also the right to
a dignified life.
-- Pope John XXIII, 1881-1963 Pacem in Terris, 1963
Power
always has to be kept in check; power exercised in
secret, especially under the cloak of national security,
is doubly dangerous.
-- William Proxmire
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"A
community is democratic only when the humblest
and weakest person can enjoy the highest civil,
economic, and social rights that the biggest
and most powerful possess."
-- A. Philip
Randolph
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Those
who have long enjoyed such privileges as we
enjoy, forget in time that men have died to
win them.
-- Franklin
D. Roosevelt
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In
every country, we should be teaching our children
the scientific method and the reasons for a
Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency,
humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted
world that we inhabit by virtue of being human,
this may be all that stands between us and the
enveloping darkness.
-- Carl
Sagan
“I
also wish that the Pledge of Allegiance were
directed at the Constitution and the Bill of
Rights, as it is when the President takes his
oath of office, rather than to the flag and
the nation”
-- Carl
Sagan
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The
'strength' of the People becomes weak when we don't
'exercise' our rights.
-- Eric Schaub
"From
the equality of rights springs identity of our highest
interests; you cannot subvert your neighbor's rights
without striking a dangerous blow at your own."
-- Carl Schurz
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As
global citizens, it is our responsibility to
become active participants in our democracy,
and to make sure that everyone's civil rights
are protected.
-- Robert Alan
Silverstein
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We
must remember that a right lost to one is lost to
all.
-- William Reece Smith, Jr
Constitutional
rights may not be infringed simply because the majority
of the people choose that they be.
-- Supreme Court of the United States
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*
There
will never be a really free and enlightened
State until the State comes to recognize the
individual as a higher and independent power,
from which all its own power and authority are
derived, and treats him accordingly.
-- Henry David
Thoreau
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"Every
segment of our population, and every individual, has
a right to expect from his government a fair deal."
-- Harry S. Truman
The
tyranny of the many would be when one body takes over
the rights of others, and then exercises its power
to change the laws in its favor.
-- Voltaire
I
may not agree with what you say, but to your death
I will defend your right to say it.
-- Voltaire
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The
constitution does not provide for first and second
class citizens.
-- Wendell Wilkie
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"Slowly
we have lifeted ourselves by our own bootstraps.
Step by halting step, we have beat our way back."
~Roy Wilkins
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An
enormous discrepancy exists between the way
we talk about equality in the abstract and the
value as translated into laws and justice.”
~Roy Wilkins
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If
you mind your own business, you won't be minding mine.
-- Hank Williams
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I
am where I am because of the bridges that I
crossed. Sojourner Truth was a bridge. Harriet
Tubman was a bridge. Ida B. Wells was a bridge.
Madame C. J. Walker was a bridge. Fannie Lou
Hamer was a bridge.
-- Oprah Winfrey
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