William O. Douglas Quotes

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• The Constitution and the Bill of Rights we designed to get the government off the backs of the people -- all the people. Those great documents guarantee to us all the rights to personal and spiritual self-fulfillment. But that guarantee is not self-executing. As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such a twilight that we all must be most aware of the change in the air -- however slight -- lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.

  William O. Douglas

  Spiritual, Twilight, Rights

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• As night-fall does not come at once, neither does oppression...It is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air - however slight - lest we become victims of the darkness.

  William O. Douglas

  Fall, Twilight, Night

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• To be whole and harmonious, man must also know the music of the beaches and the woods. He must find the thing of which he is only an infinitesimal part and nurture it and love it, if he is to live.

  William O. Douglas

  Beach, Nature, Journey

  WILLIAM O. DOUGLAS (1960). “My Wilderness THE PACIFIC WEST”

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• A people who extend civil liberties only to preferred groups start down the path either to dictatorship of the right or the left.

  William O. Douglas

  People, Liberty, Groups

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• The liberties of none are safe unless the liberties of all are protected.

  William O. Douglas

  Freedom, Atheism, Liberty

  "A Living Bill of Rights". Book by William O. Douglas, 1961.

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• I do not know of any salvation for society except through eccentrics, misfits, dissenters, people who protest.

  William O. Douglas

  People, Misfits, Salvation

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• A function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute. It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it invites a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. It may strike at prejudices and preconceptions and have profound unsettling effects as it passes for acceptance of an idea.

  William O. Douglas

  Acceptance, Ideas, Government

  "Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U.S. 1". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. May 16, 1949.

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• Only when there is a wilderness can man harmonize his inner being with the wavelengths of the earth. When the earth, its products, its creatures, become his concern, man is caught up in a cause greater than his own life and more meaningful. Only when man loses himself in an endeavor of that magnitude does he walk and live with humanity and reverence.

  William O. Douglas

  Meaningful, Men, Humanity

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• Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation in office as essential to the preservation of the nation.

  William O. Douglas

  Power, Office, Desire

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• Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.

  William O. Douglas

  Teaching, Rights In America, Political Revolution

  "The One Un-American Act". William O. Douglas' speech to the Author's Guild Council in New York on receiving the 1951 Lauterbach Award, December 3, 1952.

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• I learned early that the richness of life is found in adventure. Adventure calls on all the faculties of mind and spirit. It develops self-reliance and independence. Life then teems with excitement. But man is not ready for adventure unless he is rid of fear. For fear confines him and limits his scope. He stays tethered by strings of doubt and indecision and has only a small and narrow world to explore.

  William O. Douglas

  Adventure, Men, Richness Of Life

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• Since when have we Americans been expected to bow submissively to authority and speak with awe and reverence to those who represent us?

  William O. Douglas

  Fear, History, Bows

  "Colten v. Kentucky, 407 U.S. 104". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. June 12, 1972.

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• When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen's constitutional right to free speech, it acts lawlessly; and the citizen can take matters into his own hands and proceed on the basis that such a law is no law at all.

  William O. Douglas

  Exercise, Rights, Hands

  "Poulos v. New Hampshire, 345 U.S. 395". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. April 27, 1953.

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• Acceptance by government of a dissident press is a measure of the maturity of a nation.

  William O. Douglas

  Acceptance, Maturity, Government

  William O. Douglas (1954). “An Almanac of Liberty”

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• The way to combat noxious ideas is with other ideas. The way to combat falsehoods is with truth.

  William O. Douglas

  Ideas, Way, Combat

  Interview with Mike Wallace, November 4, 1958.

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• The river, for example, is the living symbol of all the life it sustains or nourishes - fish, aquatic insects, water ouzels, otter, fisher, deer, elk, bear, and all other animals, including man, who are dependent on it or who enjoy it for its sight, its sound, or its life. The river as plaintiff speaks for the ecological unit of life that is part of it.

  William O. Douglas

  Men, Animal, Rivers

  "Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. April 19, 1972.

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• Power that controls the economy should be in the hands of elected representatives of the people, not in the hands of an industrial oligarchy.

  William O. Douglas

  Hands, People, Economic Globalization

  "United States v. Columbia Steel Co., 334 U.S. 495". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. June 7, 1948.

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• The framers of the constitution knew human nature as well as we do. They too had lived in dangerous days; they too knew the suffocating influence of orthodoxy and standardized thought. They weighed the compulsions for restrained speech and thought against the abuses of liberty. They chose liberty.

  William O. Douglas

  Abuse, Society, Liberty

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• Hiking a ridge, a meadow, or a river bottom, is as healthy a form of exercise as one can get. Hiking seems to put all the body cells back into rhythm. Ten to twenty miles on a trail puts one to bed with his cares unraveled.

  William O. Douglas

  Nature, Exercise, Cells

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• The court is really the keeper of the conscience, and the conscience is the Constitution.

  William O. Douglas

  Constitution, Court, Keepers

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• The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.

  William O. Douglas

  Government, Libertarian Party, America

  "The Court years, 1939-1975: The Autobiography of William O. Douglas‎". Book by William O. Douglas, 1980.

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• The privacy and dignity of our citizens is being whittled away by sometimes imperceptible steps. Taken individually, each step may be of little consequence. But when viewed as a whole, there begins to emerge a society quite unlike any we have seen - a society in which government may intrude into the secret regions of a life.

  William O. Douglas

  Taken, Government, Secret

  "Osborn v. United States, 385 U.S. 323". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. December 12, 1966.

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• The Fifth Amendment is an old friend and a good friend, one of the great landmarks in men's struggle to be free of tyranny, to be decent and civilized.

  William O. Douglas

  Friendship, Struggle, Good Friend

  "An Almanac of Liberty". Book by William O. Douglas, 1954.

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• Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

  William O. Douglas

  Honesty, Sunlight

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• Man is whole when he is in tune with the winds, the stars, and the hills... Being in tune with the universe is the entire secrets.

  William O. Douglas

  Stars, Men, Wind

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