Rights Quotes

• I am in favor of animal rights as well as human rights. That is the way of a whole human being.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Meaningful, Nature, Compassion

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  America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.

  Jimmy Carter

  Inspirational, Motivational, Real

  Jimmy Carter (1995). “Talking Peace: A Vision for the Next Generation”, Puffin

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• To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity.

  Nelson Mandela

  Inspirational, Motivational, Inspiring

  Twitter post from Mar 21, 2016

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• Human rights are not only violated by terrorism, repression or assassination, but also by unfair economic structures that creates huge inequalities.

  Pope Francis

  Economic Inequality, Terrorism, Unfair

  "Pope Francis: the humble pontiff with practical approach to poverty" by Mark Rice-Oxley, www.theguardian.com. March 13, 2013.

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• We have a right to believe whatever we want, but not everything we believe is right.

  Ravi Zacharias

  Inspirational, Christian, Wisdom

  FaceBook post by Ravi Zacharias from Feb 26, 2014

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• Sharing experience and building public support for the full range of rights is more powerful than legal cases.

  Mary Robinson

  Powerful, Support, Building

  Source: www.opendemocracy.net

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• One has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Religious, Responsibility

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2011). “Why We Can't Wait”, p.60, Beacon Press

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• Whoever claims the right to redistribute the wealth produced by others is claiming the right to treat human beings as chattel.

  Ayn Rand

  Money, Liberty, Novelists

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.219, Penguin

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• Not every person is going to understand you and that's okay. They have a right to their opinion and you have every right to ignore it.

  Joel Osteen

  Inspirational, Life, Attitude

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  No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.

  Alice Walker

  Friendship, Fake Friends, Memorable

  Alice Walker (2013). “The Alice Walker Collection: Non-Fiction”, p.17, Hachette UK

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• Maybe this is crazy, but I think the right to own a gun is trumped by the right not to be shot by one.

  Andy Borowitz

  Funny, Crazy, Gun

  FaceBook post by Andy Borowitz from Dec 18, 2012

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• The Framers of the Bill of Rights did not purport to 'create' rights. Rather, they designed the Bill of Rights to prohibit our Government from infringing rights and liberties presumed to be preexisting.

  William J. Brennan

  Freedom, Government, Liberty

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• I support anyone's right to be who they want to be. My question is: to what extent do I have to participate in your self-image?

  Dave Chappelle

  Self, Support, African American

  "Banned Harry Hill gag shows a shift in attitudes to both comedy and gender" by Brian Logan, www.theguardian.com. September 29, 2016.

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• The first thing that has to happen is the protection of voting rights and registration.

  Jesse Jackson

  Voting, Firsts, Protection

  Source: praisecharlotte.hellobeautiful.com

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• If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

  George Orwell

  Inspirational, Life, Freedom

  "The Freedom of the Press" (1945)

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• If women took up arms to defend their reproductive rights, the GOP would ban assault rifles yesterday.

  Steve Marmel

  Gun, Yesterday, Rifles

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• the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Law, Majority Rule, Would Be

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

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• A right delayed is a right denied.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Rejection, Political

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  Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.

  Barry Goldwater

  Memorial Day, Freedom, Gay

  Speech accepting nomination for president at Republican National Convention, San Francisco, Cal., 16 July 1964

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• We have the right, and the obligation, to tell old stories in our own ways, because they are our stories.

  Neil Gaiman

  Writing, Stories, Narrative

  Neil Gaiman (2002). “Adventures in the Dream Trade”, N E S F A Press

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• When every benefit received is a right, there is no place for good manners, let alone for gratitude.

  Theodore Dalrymple

  Gratitude, Justice, Good Man

  Theodore Dalrymple (2001). “Life at the Bottom: The Worldview that Makes the Underclass”, Ivan R Dee

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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

  Peace, Ubuntu, People

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• Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person...Withou t concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.

  Eleanor Roosevelt

  Home, Progress, Citizens

  Remarks at presentation of booklet on human rights, In Your Hands, to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, United Nations, New York, March 27, 1958.

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• I'm not an activist; I don't look for controversy. I'm not a political person, but I'm a person with compassion. I care passionately about equal rights. I care about human rights. I care about animal rights.

  Ellen DeGeneres

  Compassion, Animal, Political

  "Ellen DeGeneres: Nice Girls Finish First". Interview with David Hochman, www.goodhousekeeping.com. September 10, 2011.

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• 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

  Gun, People, Second Amendment

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