Freedom Quotes - Page 31

• The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

  H. L. Mencken

  Time, Fighting, Political Will

  "Shut Down Chick-fil-A Properly" by James Peron, www.huffingtonpost.com. July 25, 2012.

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• Service cannot be expected from a friend in service; let him be a freeman who wishes to be my master.

  Martial

  Wish, Masters, Expected

  "Epigrams" by Martial, II. 32. 7, c. 80-104 AD.

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• Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honor steady to a common end, and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of their own.

  Woodrow Wilson

  Honor, Purpose, Common

  War Message, delivered 2 April 1917

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• Those who expect to reap the blessing of freedom must undertake to support it.

  Thomas Paine

  Blessing, Support, Reap

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• It comes from within.

  Stephen Covey

  Empowerment

  Stephen R. Covey (2016). “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change Interactive Edition”, p.377, Mango Media Inc.

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• I gave my life for freedom-This I know;
  For those who bade me fight had told me so.

  William Norman Ewer

  Fighting, Knows

  Five Souls and Other Verses (1917) "Five Souls"

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• Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one's thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down.

  Frederick Douglass

  Rights, Tyrants, Liberty

  Frederick Douglass (2013). “Selected Addresses of Frederick Douglass”, p.55, Simon and Schuster

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• 

  Art is what you can get away with.

  Andy Warhol

  Art, Creativity, Get Away

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  The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

  H. L. Mencken

  Democracies Have, Government, Libertarian Party

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.29, Vintage

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• The jaws of power are always open to devour, and her arm is always stretched out, if possible, to destroy the freedom of thinking, speaking, and writing.

  John Adams

  Writing, Power, Thinking

  A Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law (1765)

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• A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

  John Stuart Mill

  War, Military, Fighting

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• The end may justify the means as long as there is something that justifies the end.

  Leon Trotsky

  Philosophy, Mean, Long

  "When It Comes to Personal Transformation, Could the Ends Be the Means?" by Russell Bishop, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 9, 2011.

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• In free countries, every man is entitled to express his opinions and every other man is entitled not to listen.

  J. Norman Collie

  Country, Men, Democracy

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• Nobody who says, ‘I told you so’ has ever been, or will ever be, a hero.

  Ursula K. Le Guin

  Hero, Adventure, Told You So

  Ursula K. Le Guin, Susan Wood (1980). “The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction”, p.87, Ultramarine Publishing

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• It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.

  Lord Acton

  Equality, Democracies Have, Democracy

  Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom: Great Event”, p.9, VM eBooks

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• In every country where man is free to think and to speak, difference of opinion will arise from difference of perception, and the imperfection of reason; but these differences, when permitted, as in this happy country, to purify themselves by free discussion, are but as passing clouds overspreading our land transiently, and leaving our horizon more bright and serene.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Happiness, Country, Men

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1859). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence”, p.378

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• When we are no longer able to change a situation - we are challenged to change ourselves.

  Viktor E. Frankl

  Inspirational, Change, Positive

  Viktor E. Frankl (2006). “Man's Search for Meaning”, p.113, Beacon Press

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• My excellent colleagues have forgotten these bitter lessons of history. The prospect of tyranny may not grab the headlines the way vivid stories of gun crime usually do. But few saw the Third Reich coming until it was too late. The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed only for those exceptionally rare circumstances when all other rights have failed. A free people can only afford to make this mistake once.

  Alex Kozinski

  Mistake, Failure, Gun

  "United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit". openjurist.org. May 6, 2003.

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• With regard to life, modern painting is a revolutionary activity…We need it in order to transform the world into a more humane place where mankind can live in liberty…We must accept these things with passion. It means that we must live imaginatively.

  Wifredo Lam

  Life, Change, Art

  Lowery Stokes Sims, Wifredo Lam (2002). “Wifredo Lam and the International Avant-Garde, 1923-1982”

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• Those who suppress freedom always do so in the name of law and order.

  John Lindsay

  Peace, War, Order

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• This moving away from comfort and security, this stepping out into what is unknown, uncharted and shaky - that's called liberation.

  Pema Chodron

  Buddhist, Moving, Buddhism

  Pema Chodron (2001). “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living”, p.21, Shambhala Publications

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• Government is best which governs least

  Thomas Paine

  Democracies Have, Government, Libertarian Party

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• The majority is never right. Never, I tell you! That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against. Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population -- the intelligent ones or the fools?

  Henrik Ibsen

  Lying, Intelligent, Men

  Henrik Ibsen, James McFarlane (1999). “An Enemy of the People ; The Wild Duck ; Rosmersholm”, p.76, Oxford University Press, USA

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• Many think, because your skins are tinged with a sable hue, that you are an inferior race of beings; but God does not consider you as such. ... he hath made all men free and equal. Then why should one worm say to another, 'Keep you down there, while I sit up yonder; for I am better than thou?

  Maria W. Stewart

  God, Equality, Men

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• I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.

  John Diefenbaker

  Country, Believe, Thinking

  John George Diefenbaker (1982). “The Wit & Wisdom of John Diefenbaker”, Hurtig Trade

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