Thoughts
More From Benjamin Franklin
There is no kind of dishonesty into which otherwise good people more easily and frequently fall than that of defrauding the government.
2017-09-08 at 15:03:36
From Ridgway K. Foley, Jr.
What is individual freedom and what is the proper function of law? Liberty is the absence of human intervention with the endeavors of an individual to utilize his life, liberty, and property (and all adjunct rights flowing therefrom) as he sees fit and for the ends he desires, limited only by the equal liberty of all individuals in society.
2017-09-06 at 12:36:08
More From Alexis de Tocqueville
Without virtue there is no such thing as a great man; without rights there is no such thing as a great nation, and, one might almost say, no such thing as society, for what is a group of rational and intelligent beings held together solely by force?
2017-09-05 at 13:55:51
More From Leonard E. Read
My highest conscience pronounces this as a Truth. For me to speak or write or act in a contrary manner is to indulge in dissimulation, to flout Righteousness, to live lie, to deny the Truth that is within me.
2017-09-04 at 18:54:23
From Frederic Bastiat
The worst thing that can happen to a good cause is, not to be skillfully attacked, but to be ineptly defended.
2017-09-03 at 13:48:22
From Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
The state lies in all the tongues of good and evil, and whatever it says is lies, and whatever it has, it has stolen, everything it is, is false, it bites with stolen teeth, and it bites often, it is false down to its bowels.
2017-09-01 at 16:55:01
From Anthony Ashley Cooper
All politeness is owing to Liberty. We polish one another, and rub off our Corners and rough Sides by a sort of amicable Collision. To restrain this, is inevitably to bring a Rust upon Mens Understanding. Tis a destroying of Civility, Good Breeding, and even Charity itself.
2017-08-31 at 15:40:36
From John Webbe
Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature.
2017-08-30 at 13:12:10
From John Quincy Adams
America.. well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extraction, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force. ..She might become dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit.
2017-08-29 at 14:26:32
From Lord Hailsham
The only freedom which counts is the freedom to do what some other people think to be wrong. There is no point in demanding freedom to do that which all will applaud. All the so-called liberties or rights are things which have to be asserted against others who claim that if such things are to be allowed their own rights are infringed or their own liberties threatened. This is always true, even when we speak of the freedom to worship, of the right of free speech or association, or of public assembly. If we are to allow freedoms at all there will constantly be complaints that either the liberty itself or the way in which it is exercised is being abused, and, if it is a genuine freedom, these complaints will often be justified. There is no way of having a free society in which there is not abuse. Abuse is the very hallmark of liberty.
2017-08-24 at 11:48:18
From Alfred N. Whitehead
Without a society in which life and property are to some extent secure, existence can continue only at the lowest levels -- you cannot have a good life for those you love, nor can you devote you energies to activity on the higher level.
2017-08-21 at 14:09:43
From Charlotte Twight
Growing federal power -- driven by legislation, validated by Supreme Court decisions, and accelerated by presidential ambition -- has eroded the rule of law in our nation, leaving almost no activity that the central government cannot at its discretion, regulate, manipulate, or prohibit. A constitutional counterrevolution has occurred in America-one so profound that few today can imagine Americans free of dependence on government.
2017-08-18 at 16:56:57
From Plato
A tyranny is the wretchedest form of government and a tyrant grows worse from having power: he becomes and is of necessity more jealous, more faithless, more unjust, more friendless, more impious, than he was at first; he is the purveyor and cherisher of every sort of vice!!
2017-08-15 at 15:05:21
From Tacitus
The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws.
2017-08-15 at 15:00:18
More From Henry David Thoreau
It is not a mans duty as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even the most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support.]
2017-08-10 at 16:19:02