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FREEDOM QUOTES

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"Much violence is based on the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not to be shared."
-- Henri Nouwen

* Today we are engaged in a deadly global struggle with those who would intimidate, torture, and murder people for exercising the most basic freedoms. If we are to win this struggle and spread those freedoms, we must keep our own moral compass pointed in a true direction.
-- Barack Obama

Here is my advice as we begin the century that will lead to 2081. First, guard the freedom of ideas at all costs. Be alert that dictators have always played on the natural human tendency to blame others and to oversimplify. And don't regard yourself as a guardian of freedom unless you respect and preserve the rights of people you disagree with to free, public, unhampered expression.
-- Gerard K. O'Neill, 2081

There can be no prescription old enough to supersede the Law of Nature and the grant of God Almighty, who has given to all men a natural right to be free, and they have it ordinarily in their power to make themselves so, if they please.
-- James Otis

He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself.
-- Thomas Paine

* When people fear the government, there is tyranny. When government fears the people, there is liberty.
-- Thomas Paine

* "I would like to be known as a person who is concerned about freedom and equality and justice and prosperity for all people."
-- Rosa Parks

Anarchism has but one infallible, unchangeable motto, "Freedom." Freedom to discover any truth, freedom to develop, to live naturally and fully.
-- Lucy Parsons, 1905

Let us not accept violence as the way of peace. Let us instead begin by respecting true freedom: the resulting peace will be able to satisfy the world's expectations, for it will be a peace built on justice, a peace founded on the incomparable dignity of the free human being.
-- Pope John Paul II

There is but one special interest that we should be working for, and that would solve just about all of our problems, and that is our liberty.
-- Ron Paul

America was founded by men who understood that the threat of domestic tyranny is as great as any threat from abroad. If we want to be worthy of their legacy, we must resist the rush toward ever-increasing state control of our society. Otherwise, our own government will become a greater threat to our freedoms than any foreign terrorist.
-- Ron Paul

Only in a free society do individuals have the best chance to seek virtue, strive for excellence, improve their economic well-being, and achieve personal happiness... The worthy goals of civilization can only be achieved by freedom loving individuals. When government uses force, liberty is sacrificed and the goals are lost. It is freedom that is the source of all creative energy.
-- Ron Paul

* "There can be no Friendship where there is no Freedom."
-- William Penn

* “Caged birds sing of freedom, free birds fly.”
-- Thorolf Rafto

* Freedom is never granted; it is won. Justice is never given; it is exacted.
-- A. Philip Randolph

There is no power in the world that can stop the forward march of free men and women when they are joined in the solidarity of human brotherhood.
-- Walter Reuther

* "The artist must elect to fight for Freedom or for Slavery.
-- Paul Robeson

* "At all times, day by day, we have to continue fighting for freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom from want… for these are things that must be gained in peace as well as in war."
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
* Freedom means the supremacy of human rights everywhere. Our support goes to those who struggle to gain those rights or keep them.
-- Franklin D. Roosevelt

In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression --everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way-- everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants --everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a worldwide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor --anywhere in the world. That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation.
-- Franklin D. Roosevelt

The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government.
-- Franklin D. Roosevelt

* Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.
-- Theodore Roosevelt

Freedom is actually a bigger game than power. Power is about what you can control. Freedom is about what you can unleash.
-- Harriet Rubin

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

* Sometimes the lack of substantive freedoms relates directly to economic poverty
-- Amartya Sen

Sometimes the lack of substantive freedoms relates directly to economic poverty, which robs people of the freedom to satisfy hunger; or to achieve sufficient nutrition, or to obtain remedies for treatable illnesses or the opportunity to be adequatley clothed or sheltered, or to enjoy clean water or sanitary facilities. In other cases, the unfreedom links closely to the lack of public facilities and social care, such as the absence of epidemiological programs, or of organized arrangements for the health care or educational facilities, or of effective insititutions for the maintenance of local peace and order. In still other cases, the violation of freedom results directly from a denial of political and civil liberties by authoritarian regimes and from imposed restrictions on the freedom to participate in the social, political and economic life of the community.
--
Amartya Sen

Liberty is the possibility of doubting, of making a mistake,... of searching and experimenting,... of saying No to any authority - literary, artistic, philosophical, religious, social, and even political.
-- Ignazio Silone

Freedom is the most basic of all human rights, and yet throughout history many individuals and nations have had to struggle to be free. Much progress has been made in helping to win freedom for all. But even though all nations agreed to uphold the Universal Declaration of Human Rights for their citizens, many people are not allowed these basic liberties.
-- Robert Alan Silverstein

 

Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man or order of men.
-- Adam Smith

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.
-- Adlai Stevenson

 

FREEDOM QUOTES
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Freedom Day - February 1
End Slavery Day - December 2

End Slavery Quotes

 

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