Best liberty & crime Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“Your national greatness, swelling vanity; your denunciation of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy-a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages.”

“We ought to be very cautious in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty, and may be the origin of a number of petty acts of tyranny if the legislator be not on his guard; for as such an accusation does not bear directly on the overt acts of a citizen, but refers to the idea we entertain of his character.”

“Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill it teaches the whole people by example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy. To declare that in the administration of the criminal law the end justifies the means - to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure the conviction of a private criminal - would bring terrible retributions.”

“Far from a simple attempt to rid the nation of crime and drugs, our policy against narcotics -- like any public policy -- comes with strings attached. And increasingly these strings are constricting around the necks of Americans' lives and liberties.”

Nations Simple Liberty Crime Policy Drug Necks Strings Public Policy Narcotics Strings Attached

Author:Joel Miller

“Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime, from the sowing of the seed at Athens, 2,460 years ago, until the ripened harvest was gathered by men of our race. It is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization; and scarcely a century has passed since nations, that knew the meaning of the term, resolved to be free. In every age its progress has been beset by its natural enemies, by ignorance and superstition, by lust of conquest and by love of ease, by the strong man's craving for power, and the poor man's craving for food.”

“When a juvenile offender commits a heinous crime, the State can exact forfeiture of some of the most basic liberties, but the State cannot extinguish his life and his potential to attain a mature understanding of his own humanity.”

States Humanity Understanding Liberty Crime Commit Mature Death Penalty Juvenile Heinous Crimes

Author:Anthony Kennedy

“Anarchists know that a long period of education must precede any great fundamental change in society, hence they do not believe in vote begging, nor political campaigns, but rather in the development of self-thinking individuals. We look away from government for relief, because we know that force (legalized) invades the personal liberty of man, seizes upon the natural elements and intervenes between man and natural laws; from this exercise of force through governments flows nearly all the misery, poverty, crime and confusion existing in society.”

“The worst crime against working people is a company which fails to operate at a profit.”

People Business Company Liberty Failing Worst Crime Failure Profit Libertarian Libertarianism

Author:Samuel Gompers

“We ought to be very cautious and circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty.”

May Two Wisdom Politics Liberty Economy Magic Crime Ought Liberalism Cautious Heresy Prosecution

Author:Baron de Montesquieu

“The impulse to make ourselves safer by making ourselves less free is an old one ... When we are badly frightened, we think we can make ourselves safer by sacrificing some of our liberties. We did it during the McCarthy era out of fear of communism. Less liberty is regularly proposed as a solution to crime, to pornography, to illegal immigration, to abortion, to all kinds of threats.”

Thinking Kind Liberty Rights Sacrifice Security Crime Solutions Threat Immigration All Kinds Communism Eras Impulse Abortion Illegal Frightened Pornography Illegal Immigration

Author:Molly Ivins

“Experience shows that the frequent use of severe punishment has never rendered a people better. The death of a criminal is a less effective means of restraining crimes than the permanent example of a man deprived of his liberty during the whole of his life to make amends for the injury he has done to the public.”

People Men Mean Done Whole Use Shows Liberty Crime Example Criminals Punishment Permanent Injury Severe Deprived Death Penalty Amends Restraining

Author:Catherine the Great

“This Administration also puts forward a false choice between the liberties we cherish and the security we demand... That means no more illegal wire-tapping of American citizens. No more national security letters to spy on citizens who are not suspected of a crime. No more tracking citizens who do nothing more than protest a misguided war. No more ignoring the law when it is inconvenient. That is not who we are.”

“Lucky are you, reader, if you happen not to be of that sex to whom it is forbidden all good things; to whom liberty is denied; to whom almost all virtues are denied; lucky are you if you are one of those who can be wise without its being a crime.”

Ifs Happens Sex Women Liberty Virtue Wise Crime Reader Lucky Good Things Denied Forbidden Being Wise

Author:Marie de Gournay

“The liberty of the press would be an empty sound, and no man would venture to write on any subject, however, pure his purpose, without an attorney at one elbow and a counsel at the other. From minds thus subdued by the fear of punishment, there could issue no works of genius to expand the empire of human reason.”

“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.”

“The storm center of lawlessness in every American State is the State Capitol. It is there that the worst crimes are committed; it is there that lawbreaking attains to the estate and dignity of a learned profession; it is there that contempt for the laws is engendered, fostered, and spread broadcast.”

States Government Law Liberty Worst Crime Dignity Committed Spread Storm Profession Contempt Estates Capitol Lawlessness

Author:H. L. Mencken

“The crime of ingratitude has not yet stained, and I trust never will stain, our national character. You are considered by them as not only having rendered important service in our own revolution, but as being, on a more extended scale, the friend of human rights, and able advocate of public liberty. To the welfare of Thomas Paine, the Americas are not, nor can they be, indifferent.”

Humans Important Character Able Liberty Rights Atheism Crime Revolution Human Rights Positive Atheism Scales Welfare Indifferent Stains Ingratitude Paine

Author:James Monroe

“Can a free people restrain crime without sacrificing fundamental liberties and a heritage of compassion?... Let us show that we can temper together those opposite elements of liberty and restraint into one consistent whole. Let us set an example for the world of a law-abiding America glorying in its freedom as well as its respect for law.”

People World Wells Whole Shows Together America Law Freedom Compassion Liberty Sacrifice Crime Example Elements Opposites Fundamentals Consistent Heritage Temper Restraint Abiding

Author:Gerald R. Ford

“... imprisonment itself, entailing loss of liberty, loss of citizenship, separation from family and loved ones, is punishment enough for most individuals, no matter how favorable the circumstances under which the time is passed.”

Matter Enough Individual Loss Liberty Crime Circumstances Prison Separation Punishment Loved Ones Citizenship Imprisonment

Author:Mary B. Harris

“Don't you think it would be better to legalize victimless crimes like drugs & prostitution & divert the resources to more important things like the rapes & assaults & things like that?”

Thinking Important Would Be Liberty Crime Drug Resources Important Things Assault Prostitution

Author:Larry King

“The War on Drugs has failed - but it’s worse than that. It is actively harming our society. Violent crime is thriving in the shadows to which the drug trade has been consigned. People who genuinely need help can’t get it. Neither can people who need medical marijuana to treat terrible diseases. We are spending billions, filling up our prisons with non-violent offenders and sacrificing our liberties.”

“A struggle for liberty is in itself respectable and glorious. . . . When conducted with magnanimity, justice and humanity, it ought to command the admiration of every friend to human nature. But if sullied by crimes and extravagancies, it loses its respectability.”

Ifs Humans Humanity Loses Justice Liberty Struggle Human Nature Crime Ought Command Glorious Admiration Respectable Respectability Magnanimity

Book:Citizen Hamilton: The Wit and Wisdom of an American Founder

Source: Citizen Hamilton: The Wit and Wisdom of an American Founder

“The September 11 attacks were major atrocities. . . . This was a horrendous crime . . . The primary victims . . . were working people: janitors, secretaries, firemen, etc. It is likely to prove to be a crushing blow to Palestinians . . . It is also likely to lead to harsh security controls, with many possible ramifications for undermining civil liberties and internal freedom.”

“The old question still remains: Can a free people restrain crime without sacrificing fundamental liberties and a heritage of compassion?”

People Stills Compassion Liberty Sacrifice Crime Fundamentals Remains Heritage

Author:Gerald R. Ford

“I will not attack your doctrines nor your creeds if they accord liberty to me. If they hold thought to be dangerous - if they aver that doubt is a crime, then I attack them one and all, because they enslave the minds of men.”

Ifs Men Mind Liberty Doubt Dangerous Crime Doctrine Thrive Creeds Accord

Book:The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll

Source: The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll

“While the machinery of law enforcement and indeed the nature of crime itself have changed dramatically since the Fourth Amendment became part of the Nation's fundamental law in 1791, what the Framers understood then remains true today - that the task of combating crime and convicting the guilty will in every era seem of such critical and pressing concern that we may be lured by the temptations of expediency into forsaking our commitment to protecting individual liberty and privacy.”

“We shall look on crime as a disease, and its physicians shall displace the judges, its hospitals displace the Galleys. Liberty and health shall be alike. We shall pour balm and oil where we formerly applied iron and fire; evil will be treated in charity, instead of in anger. This change will be simple and sublime.”

Looks Evil Simple Liberty Fire Crime Judging Disease Charity Oil Treated Iron Hospitals Physicians Sublime

Book:Delphi Complete Works of Victor Hugo (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Victor Hugo (Illustrated)

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Liberty Quotes