Religious Rights Quotes

• The clergy, by getting themselves established by law and in-grafted into the machine of government, have been a very formidable engine against the civil and religious rights of man.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Men, Rights

  Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.172, Cambridge University Press

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• I am frankly sick and tired of the political preachers telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in A, B, C, and D. Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me?

  Barry Goldwater

  Believe, Tired, Thinking

  "Excerpts From Goldwater Remarks". Remarks in the Congressional Record, www.nytimes.com. September 15, 1981.

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• The civil rights of none, shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext infringed.

  James Madison

  Religious, Rights, Liberty

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

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• We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Life, Change, Happiness

  Declaration of Independence (1776).

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• The oldest philosophy in the world is conservatism, and I go clear back to the first Greeks. ... When you say 'radical right' today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party away from the Republican Party, and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye.

  Barry Goldwater

  Goodbye, Religious, Philosophy

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• Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.

  Barry Goldwater

  Christian, Religious, Party

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• It is necessary for every American, with becoming energy to endeavor to stop the dissemination of principles evidently destructive of the cause for which they have bled. It must be the combined virtue of the rulers and of the people to do this, and to rescue and save their civil and religious rights from the outstretched arm of tyranny, which may appear under any mode or form of government.

  Mercy Otis Warren

  Religious, Rights, Government

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• In a free government the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights.

  James Madison

  Religious, Rights, Government

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1852). “The Federalist: On the New Constitution, Written in 1788”, p.241

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• I am now speaking of rights under the Constitution, and not of moral or religious rights. I do not discuss the morals of the people of Missouri, but let them settle that matter for themselves. I hold that the people of the slaveholding States are civilized men as well as ourselves, that they bear consciences as well as we, and that they are accountable to God and their posterity and not to us. It is for them to decide therefore the moral and religious right of the slavery question for themselves within their own limits.

  Stephen A. Douglas

  Religious, Men, Rights

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• I am the greatest advocate of the Constitution....The only fault I find with the Constitution is, it is not broad enough to cover the whole ground. Although it provides that all men shall enjoy religious freedom, yet it does not provide the manner by which that freedom can be preserved, nor for the punishment of Government officers who refuse to protect the people in their religious rights, punish those mobs, states, or communities who interfere with the rights of the people on account of their religion. Its sentiments are good, but it provides no means of enforcing them.

  Joseph Smith, Jr.

  Religious, Mean, Men

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• I heard the prophet Joseph Smith say the time would come when this nation would so far depart from its original purity, its glory, and its love for freedom and its protection of civil rights and religious rights, that the Constitution of our country would hang as it were by a thread. He said, also, that this people, the sons of Zion, would rise up and save the Constitution and bear it off triumphantly.

  Eliza R. Snow

  Country, Religious, Son

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• His Majesty's Government views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

  Arthur Balfour

  Country, Religious, Home

  Letter to Lionel Walter, Lord Rothschild, 2 Nov. 1917. Known as the "Balfour Declaration."

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• 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. The degree of security in both cases, will depend on the number of interests and sects; and this may be presumed to depend on the extent of country and number of People comprehended under the same Government.

  James Madison

  Country, Religious, Rights

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay, J.R. Pole (2005). “The Federalist”, p.283, Hackett Publishing

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• What other nations call religious toleration, we call religious rights. They are not exercised in virtue of governmental indulgence, but as rights, of which government cannot deprive any portion of citizens, however small.

  Richard Mentor Johnson

  Religious, Rights, Government

  "Discovering the American Past: A Look at the Evidence, Volume I: To 1877". Book by William Bruce Wheeler, Volume 2, p. 149, January 1, 2011.

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• We are persuaded that good Christians will always be good citizens, and that where righteousness prevails among individuals the Nation will be great and happy. Thus while just government protects all in their religious rights, true religion affords to government it's surest support.

  George Washington

  Christian, Religious, 4th Of July

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• If I could have entertained the slightest apprehension that the Constitution framed in the Convention where I had the honor to preside might possibly endanger the religious rights of any ecclesiastical society, certainly I would never have placed my signature to it.

  George Washington

  Religious, Rights, Honor

  George Washington, Jared Sparks (1848). “pt. V. Speeches and messages to Congress, proclamations, and addresses”, p.155

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• Whenever equality rights and religious rights collide, equality rights trump.

  Vic Toews

  Religious, Rights, Trump

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• Rights mean you have a right to your life. You have a right to your liberty, and you should have a right to keep the fruits of your labor....I, in a way, don’t like to use those terms: gay rights, women’s rights, minority rights, religious rights. There’s only one type of right. It’s the right to your liberty.

  Ron Paul

  Religious, Mean, Gay

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• 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

  Religious, Rights, Government

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1842). “The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in the Year 1788”, p.241

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• The Liberty of the press is the Palladium of all the civil, political and religious rights of an Englishman.

  Junius

  Religious, Rights, Political

  'The Letters of Junius' (1772 ed.) 'Dedication to the English Nation'

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