On Liberty Quotes

Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.

Life in the state of nature is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

Though I bequeath you no estate, I leave you in the enjoyment of liberty.

I would die to preserve the law upon a solid foundation; but take away liberty, and the foundation is destroyed.

A nation may lose its liberties in a day and not miss them in a century.

'Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.

Now that I look back, I realize that a life predicated on being obedient is a very comfortable life indeed. Living in such a way reduces to a minimum one's own need to think.

Democracy is the road to socialism.

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Remember civil and religious liberty always go together: if the foundation of the one be sapped, the other will fall of course.

I started with this idea in my head, "There's two things I've got a right to, death or liberty."

Our union is now complete; our constitution composed, established, and approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties.

Enslave the liberty of but one human being and the liberties of the world are put in peril.

There will come a time when it isn't 'They're spying on me through my phone' anymore. Eventually, it will be 'My phone is spying on me'.

Should any man tell you that a mountain had changed its place, you are at liberty to doubt it if you think fit; but if any one tells you that a man has changed his character, do not believe it.

Liberty is the right of every man to be honest, to think and to speak without hypocrisy.

I like the religion that teaches liberty, equality and fraternity.

Mankind are governed more by their feelings than by reason.

The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.

There can be no such thing as 'fairness in taxation.' Taxation is nothing but organized theft, and the concept of a 'fair tax' is therefore every bit as absurd as that of 'fair theft.'

We prefer poverty in liberty than riches in slavery.

The most urgent necessity is, not that the State should teach, but that it should allow education. All monopolies are detestable, but the worst of all is the monopoly of education.

Our country may be likened to a new house. We lack many things, but we possess the most precious of all - liberty!

Federalism isn’t about states’ rights. It’s about dividing power to better protect individual liberty.

Liberty... is there only when there is no abuse of power.

Republicans are horrible with civil liberties, and not so good with dollars and cents. Democrats are horrible with dollars and cents, and not so good with civil liberties.

To tax the larger incomes at a higher percentage than the smaller, is to lay a tax on industry and economy; to impose a penalty on people for having worked harder and saved more than their neighbors.

The rights of the individual should be the primary object of all governments.

A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy.

If the liberties of the American people are ever destroyed, they will fall by the hands of the clergy.

It is easy to be conspicuously 'compassionate' if others are being forced to pay the cost.

No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices.

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

Our lives, our liberty, and our property are never in greater danger than when Congress is in session.

I grew up like a neglected weed, ignorant of liberty, having no experience of it. Then I was not happy or contented: every time I saw a white man I was afraid of being carried away.

Everyone wants to live at the expense of the state. They forget that the state wants to live at the expense of everyone.

No matter how worthy the cause, it is robbery, theft, and injustice to confiscate the property of one person and give it to another to whom it does not belong.

The emigrants although of different parties and different religious sects all flew from persecution in pursuit of liberty.

Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends [life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness] it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government.

The liberties of a people depend on their own constant attention to its preservation.

We are now forming a republican government. Real liberty is never found in despotism or the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments.

O, let my land be a land where Liberty Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, and life is free, Equality is in the air we breathe.

The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.

There is a price tag on human liberty. That price is the willingness to assume the responsibilities of being free men. Payment of this price is a personal matter with each of us.

The society exists for the benefit of its members; not its members for the benefit of the society.

Liberty will not long survive the total extinction of morals.

He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.

A chip on the shoulder is too heavy a piece of baggage to carry through life.

The State is, and always has been, the great single enemy of the human race, its liberty, happiness, and progress.

If one person has a right to something he did not earn, of necessity it requires that another person not have a right to something that he did earn.