The quote database

If we would promise we must put ourselves in a position to perform our promise.

We should make every effort to prevent humiliating and degrading prohibition against any of our citizens wishing temporarily to sojourn in foreign countries because of race or religion.

The public officials charged with executing the law might do injustice in heated controversy through unconscious pride of opinion and obstinacy of conclusion.

The general proposition that freedom of expression upon public questions is secured by the First Amendment has long been settled by our decisions.

that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials

a punishment must not by its severity be degrading to human dignity

If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment , it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.

We do not consecrate the flag by punishing its desecration, for in doing so we dilute the freedom that this cherished emblem represents.

When once a decision is reached and execution is the order of the day, dismiss absolutely all responsibility and care about the outcome.

Hence, I cannot but regard oppression in every form--and most of all, that which turns a man into a thing--with indignation and abhorrence.

Convince me that one man may rightfully make another man his slave, and I will no longer subscribe to the Declaration of Independence.

Every slave is a stolen man; every slaveholder is a man-stealer.

Show me the government which can be maintained only by destroying the rights of a portion of the people; and you will indicate the duty of openly revolting against it.

What you demand for yourselves, in virtue of your manhood, I demand for the enslaved at the South, on the same ground.

We want no wars of conquest; we must avoid the temptation of territorial aggression.

Arbitration is the true method of settlement of international as well as local or individual differences.

War should never be entered upon until every agency of peace has failed; peace is preferable to war in almost every contingency.

There are some national questions in the solution of which patriotism should exclude partisanship.

Honesty, capacity, and industry are nowhere more indispensable than in public employment.

Nature does not give us our livelihood gratis; we must win it by toil of some sort or degree.

The vitality of civil and political institutions in our society depends on free discussion.

The right to speak freely and to promote diversity of ideas and programs is therefore one of the chief distinctions that sets us apart from totalitarian regimes.

Free speech has occupied an exalted position because of the high service it has given our society.

Free speech--the glory of our system of government--should not be sacrificed on anything less than plain and objective proof of danger that the evil advocated is imminent.

The quality of advocacy turns on the depth of the conviction; and government has no power to invade that sanctuary of belief and conscience.