“If there was ever a just war since the world began, it is this in which America is now engaged.”
“The American Revolution was a vindication of liberties inherited and possessed. It was a conservative revolution.”
“My call is the call of battle- I nourish active rebellion;/ He going with me must go well armed.”
Source: Walt Whitman: Selected Poems 1855-1892
“Disobedience, the rarest and most courageous of the virtues, is seldom distinguished from neglect, the laziest and commonest of the vices.”
Source: George Bernard Shaw: Collected Articles, Lectures, Essays and Letters: Thoughts and Studies from the Renowned Dramaturge and Author of Mrs. Warren’s Profession, Pygmalion, Arms and The Man, Saint Joan, Caesar and Cleopatra, Androcles And The Lion
“Tyranny brings ignorance and brutality with it. It degrades men from their just rank into the class of brutes; it damps their spirits; it suppresses art; it extinguishes every spark of noble ardor and generosity in the breasts of those who are enslaved by it; it makes naturally strong and great minds feeble and little, and triumphs over the ruins of virtue and humanity.”
“No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it.”
Source: The life of Samuel Johnson, LL. D., comprehending an account of his studies, and numerous works, in chronological order: a series of his epistolary correspondence and conversations with many eminent persons; and various original pieces of his composition, never before published; the whole exhibiting a view of literature and literary men in Great Britain, for near half a century during which he flourished
“It is lawful and hath been held so through all ages for any one who have the power to call to account a tyrant or wicked king, and after due conviction to depose and put him to death.”
Source: The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates: Proving, that it is Lawfull, and Hath Been Held So Through All Ages, for Any, who Have the Power, to Call to Account a Tyrant, Or Wicked King, and After Due Conviction, to Depose, and Put Him to Death; If the Ordinary Magistrate Have Neglected, Or Deny'd to Doe It. And that They, who of Late So Much Blame Deposing, are the Men that Did it Themselves. Published Now the Second Time with Some Additions, and Many Testimonies Also Added Out of the Best & Learnedest Among Protestant Divines Asserting the Position of this Book
“In your dread of dictators you established a state of society in which every ward boss is a dictator, every private employer a dictator, every financier a dictator, all with the livelihood of the workers at his mercy, and no public responsibility.”
“Despotism has forever had a powerful hold upon the world. Autocratic government, not self-government, has been the prevailing state of mankind. The record of past history is the record, not of the success of republics, but of their failure.”
Source: The Price of Freedom: Speeches and Addresses
“It violates right order whenever capital so employs the working or wage-earning classes as to divert business and economic activity entirely to its own arbitrary will and advantage, without any regard to the human dignity of the workers, the social character of economic life, social justice, and the common good.”
Source: Forty Years After: Reconstructing the Social Order