A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference. — Thomas Jefferson
We have the Bill of Rights. What we need is a Bill of Responsibilities. — Bill Maher
A Bill of Rights that means what the majority wants it to mean is worthless. — Antonin Scalia
The truth is, after all the declamations we have heard, that the Constitution is itself, in every rational sense, and to every useful purpose, A BILL OF RIGHTS. — Alexander Hamilton
It is doubtful that congress would pass the Bill of Rights if it were introduced today. — Earl Warren
Can any of you seriously say the Bill of Rights could get through Congress today? It wouldn't even get out of committee. — F. Lee Bailey
The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty, shall be inviolable. — James Madison
There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. — Smedley Butler
Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can. — Samuel Adams
A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. — James Madison
The right to buy weapons is the right to be free. — A. E. van Vogt
The makers of our Constitution . . . conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone - the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men. — Louis D. Brandeis
the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression. — Thomas Jefferson
Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. — Bill Hicks
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. — James Madison
The nation's government has just handed me the bill that grants us our civil rights. I am receiving it before you, certain that I am accepting this on behalf of all Argentinean women, and I can feel my hands tremble with joy as they grasp the laurel proclaiming victory. — Evita Peron
Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life. Tip top if you must, but take the step.
I cannot agree with those who think of the Bill of Rights as an 18th century straitjacket, unsuited for this age...The evils it guards against are not only old, they are with us now, they exist today. — Hugo Black
Let us hope our weapons are never needed - but do not forget what the common people of this nation knew when they demanded the Bill of Rights: An armed citizenry is the first defense, the best defense, and the final defense against tyranny. — Edward Abbey
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. — Joseph Story
Live your life. Take chances. Be crazy. Don't wait. Because right now is the oldest you've ever been and the youngest you'll ever be again.
To take a single step beyond the boundaries specially drawn around the powers of Congress is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible to definition. — Thomas Jefferson
And I sort of look at us as two of the luckiest guys [Bill Gates the other] on the planet because we found what we loved to do and we were at the right place at the right time and we've gotten to go to work every day with super bright people for 30 years and do what we love doing. — Steve Jobs
Let us welcome controversial books and controversial authors. — John F. Kennedy
The Bill of Rights isn't about us, it's about them . It isn't a list of things we're permitted to do, it's a list of things they aren't allowed even to consider. — L. Neil Smith
Constitutional Rights Quotes
We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution. — Abraham Lincoln
History teaches that grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure. — Thurgood Marshall
Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. — George Washington
If things go wrong, don’t go with them.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it. — Abraham Lincoln
To the contrary, the government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, a civil war and momentous social transformation to attain the system of constitutional government, and its respect for the individual freedoms and human rights, we hold as fundamental today. — Thurgood Marshall
The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge right or make good decision. — Alexander Hamilton
Do what you feel in your heart to be right, for you’ll be criticized anyways.
Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. — Alice Paul
My answer to the racial problem in America is to not deal with it at all. The founding fathers dealt with it when they made the Constitution. — James Meredith
One great object of the Constitution was to restrain majorities from oppressing minorities or encroaching upon their just rights. — James K. Polk
Cruelty to animals is one of the most significant vices of a low and ignoble people. Wherever one notices them, they constitute a sign of ignorance and brutality which cannot be painted over even by all the evidence of wealth and luxury. — Alexander von Humboldt
Political Rights Quotes
If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power. — Dwight D. Eisenhower
The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders...tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. — Hermann Goring
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong. — Voltaire
Stop being afraid of what could go wrong, and start being excited of what could go right.
All talk on Islamic States is just an empty dream. No man in his right sense would accept a nation which bases its political administration on religion, and in a country like Malaysia with its multiracial and multireligious people, there is no room for an Islamic State. — Tunku Abdul Rahman
We hear a constant clamor for rights, rights, always rights, but so very little about responsibility. And we have forgotten God. The need now is for selflessness, for a spirit of sacrifice, for a willingness to put aside personal gains for the salvation of the whole Western world. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
When plunder becomes a way of life, men create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it. — Frederic Bastiat
Knowledge is having the right answer. Intelligence is asking the right questions.
Republican is fine, if your a millionaire. Democrats is fair, if all you own is what you wear. Neither of them's really right, cause neither of them care. — Frank Zappa
It is unthinkable that a national government which represents women should ignore the issue of the right of all women to political freedom. — Lucy Burns
I had a right to my own political opinions. I am a Southern woman, born with Revolutionary blood in my veins. Freedom of speech and of thought were my birthright, guaranteed, signed and sealed by the blood of our fathers. — Rose O'Neal Greenhow
The Church must take right ground in regard to politics... Politics are a part of a religion in such a country as this, and Christians must do their duty to the country as part of their duty to God... God will bless or curse this nation, according to the course Christians take in politics. — Charles Grandison Finney
Rights And Freedoms Quotes
Revolution is an inalienable right of mankind. Freedom is an imperishable birth right of all. Labor is the real sustainer of society, the sovereignty of the ultimate destiny of the workers. — Bhagat Singh
Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one's thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. — Frederick Douglass
I am determined to defend my rights and maintain my freedom or sell my life in the attempt. — Nathanael Greene
A nation of well-informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the region of ignorance that tyranny begins.” Benjamin Franklin — Benjamin Franklin
After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn't do it. — William S. Burroughs
If it is right for men to fight for their freedom, and God knows what the human race would be like today if men had not, since time began, fought for their freedom, then it is right for women to fight for their freedom and the freedom of the children they bear. — Emmeline Pankhurst
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. — Benjamin Franklin
The civil rights movement didn't begin in Montgomery and it didn't end in the 1960s. It continues on to this very minute. — Julian Bond
Everything you do right now ripples outward and affects everyone. Your posture can shine your heart or transmit anxiety. Your breath can radiate love or muddy the room in depression. Your glance can awaken joy. Your words can inspire freedom. Your every act can open hearts and minds. — David Deida
Free expression is the base of human rights, the root of human nature and the mother of truth. To kill free speech is to insult human rights, to stifle human nature and to suppress truth. — Liu Xiaobo
Basic Rights Quotes
Child labour is an issue of grave importance. It must become a top priority for all governments of the world. How can the world move into the twenty-first century with children still being exploited for their labour and denied their basic right to an education? — Craig Kielburger
We all require and want respect, man or woman, black or white. It's our basic human right. — Aretha Franklin
Those of us who shout the loudest about Americanism, are all too frequently those who . . . ignore some of the basic principles of Americanism-the right to criticize, the right to hold unpopular beliefs, the right to protest, the right of independent thought. — Margaret Chase Smith
This is not just Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This is the beginning of a war against Europe, against European structures, against democracy, against basic human rights, against a global order of law, rules and peaceful coexistence. — Volodymyr Zelenskyy
Everyone has a right to peaceful coexistence, the basic personal freedoms, the alleviation of suffering, and the opportunity to lead a productive life. — Jimmy Carter
Basically, right before college I got into the Guinness book for my feet and started to do local commercials and little radio spots, just little things and found I really liked it. — Matthew McGrory
No man can always be right. So the struggle is to do one's best, to keep the brain and conscience clear, never be swayed by unworthy motives or inconsequential reasons, but to strive to unearth the basic factors involved, then do one's duty. — Sayings
In times of life crisis, whether wild fires or smoldering stress, the first thing I do is go back to basics... am I eating right, am I getting enough sleep, am I getting some physical and mental exercise everyday. — Edward Albert
We must build a movement for education, not incarceration. A movement for jobs, not jails. A movement that will end all forms of discrimination against people released from prison - discrimination that denies them basic human rights to work, shelter and food. — Michelle Alexander
Of the people, by the people, for the people. — Sun Yat-sen
Discrimination is discrimination no matter who the victim is, and it is always wrong. There are no special rights in America, despite the attempts by many to divide blacks and the gay community with the argument that the latter are seeking some imaginary special rights at the expense of blacks. — Julian Bond
I don't believe in quotas. America was founded on a philosophy of individual rights, not group rights. — Clarence Thomas
Freedom can exist only in the society of knowledge. Without learning, men are incapable of knowing their rights. — Benjamin Rush
The Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms. — Samuel Adams
America needs no words from me to see how your decision in Roe v. Wade has deformed a great nation. The so-called right to abortion has pitted mothers against their children and women against men. — Mother Teresa
We’re making new investments in the development of gasoline and diesel and jet fuel that’s actually made from a plant-like substance-algae... We could replace up to 17 percent of the oil we import for transportation with this fuel that we can grow right here in the United States. — Barack Obama
In 1960, when I came out of prison as an ex-convict, I had more freedom under parolee supervision than there's available... in America right now. — Merle Haggard
All I did in Chicago was to exercise my legal right to speak on my own behalf and I was given four years in jail as a result. But I think the most serious injustice perpetrated by the court system in America is the inability of a black man to get a jury of his peers. — Bobby Seale
Fundamental Rights Quotes
The fundamental basis of this nation’s laws was given to Moses on the Mount…If we don’t have a proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a totalitarian government which does not believe in rights for anybody except the State. — Harry S. Truman
Privatization is a neoliberal and imperialist plan. Health can't be privatized because it is a fundamental human right, nor can education, water, electricity and other public services. They can't be surrendered to private capital that denies the people from their rights. — Hugo Chavez
Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice. It is the protection of a fundamental human right, the right to dignity and a decent life . . . — Nelson Mandela
The right to happiness is fundamental. — Anna Pavlova
To hold that the act of homosexual sodomy is somehow protected as a fundamental right would be to cast aside millennia of moral teaching. — Warren E. Burger
The issue of human rights is one of the most fundamental human issues and also one of the most sensitive and controversial. — Ali Khamenei
Each state, so that it does not abridge the great fundamental rights belonging, under the Constitution, to all citizens, may grant or withhold such civil rights as it pleases; all that is required is that, in this respect, its laws shall be impartial. — Lyman Trumbull
What libertarians assert is simply that differences among normal adults do not imply different fundamental rights. — Tom G. Palmer
Scotland is not a region of the U.K.; Scotland is a nation, and if we cannot protect our interests within a U.K. that is going to be changing fundamentally, then that right of Scotland to consider the options of independence has to be there. — Nicola Sturgeon
Democratic Rights Quotes
Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future. — John F. Kennedy
If we desire a society without discrimination, then we must not discriminate against anyone in the process of building this society. If we desire a society that is democratic, then democracy must become a means as well as an end. — Bayard Rustin
A community is democratic only when the humblest and weakest person can enjoy the highest civil, economic, and social rights that the biggest and most powerful possess. — A. Philip Randolph
I stand for simple justice, equal opportunity and human rights. The indispensable elements in a democratic society - and well worth fighting for. — Helen Suzman
I found that it was all right to have Martians saying things Democrats and Republicans could never say. — Rod Serling
We should cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better. — George F. Kennan
And I think to be in NATO for the countries of our region, it means more guarantees for us, it means more responsibility for our common security, but it means fulfillment of all standards of civilized world, like protection of human rights and democratic mechanisms. — Aleksander Kwasniewski
The message was wrong, I knew that now, but maybe the tactics were right. Perhaps we could use the methods of the Islamist groups to create a counter-Islamist movement, to do da’wah for the democratic culture? — Maajid Nawaz
Since achieving their independence in 1992, the people of Croatia have built a democratic society based on the rule of law, respect for human rights, and a free market economy. — Elton Gallegly
I do believe the Democratic party has moved far to the right. I do believe that the party has a bunch of elephants running around in donkey clothes. — Al Sharpton
Basic Human Rights Quotes
The basic problem affecting the Pakistan today is human rights. Islamic fundamentalists have no roots among the common people and while they are pushing hard for religious fundamentalists to take hold, the common people still seek change through humanitarian and common human rights law. — Abdul Sattar Edhi
To become self-aware, people must be allowed to hear a plurality of opinions and then make up their own minds. They must be allowed to say, write and publish whatever they want. Freedom of expression is the most basic, but fundamental, right. Without it, human beings are reduced to automatons. — Ma Jian
It's time to recognise the internet as a basic human right. That means guaranteeing affordable access for all, ensuring internet packets are delivered without commercial or political discrimination, and protecting the privacy and freedom of web users regardless of where they live. — Tim Berners-Lee
Basically we could not have peace, or an atmosphere in which peace could grow, unless we recognized the rights of individual human beings... their importance, their dignity... and agreed that was the basic thing that had to be accepted throughout the world. — Eleanor Roosevelt
We can never have too much preparation and training. We must be a strong competitor. We must adhere staunchly to the basic principle that anything less than full equality is not enough. If we compromise on that principle our soul is dead. — Ralph Bunche
The very right to be human is denied every day to hundreds of millions of people as a result of poverty, the unavailability of basic necessities such as food, jobs, water and shelter, education, health care and a healthy environment. — Nelson Mandela
Old ideas die hard. We've had thousands of years of women having almost no rights. Parts of the world are in a struggle toward very basic human rights for women, and most of the world isn't even there yet. And it's going to take a long time to change these attitudes. — KaThe Kollwitz
When the man who feeds the world by toiling in the fields is himself deprived of the basic rights of feeding, sheltering, and caring for his own family, the whole community of man is sick. — Cesar Chavez
Human rights commissions, as they are evolving, are an attack on our fundamental freedoms and the basic existence of a democratic society... It is in fact totalitarianism. I find this is very scary stuff. — Stephen Harper
There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences. — P. J. O'Rourke
Unalienable Rights Quotes
The people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government and to reform, alter, or totally change the same when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it. — Alexander Hamilton
Nothing is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man. — Thomas Jefferson
The right of parents to direct the upbringing of their children is among the unalienable rights with which the Declaration of Independence proclaims 'all Men are endowed by their Creator.' — Antonin Scalia
God forbid that the day should ever come when, in the American mind, the thought of man as a consumer shall submerge the old American thought of man as a creature of God, endowed with unalienable rights. — Benjamin Harrison
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed — Walter E. Williams
Conscience is the most sacred of all property; other property depending in part on positive law, the exercise of that, being a natural and unalienable right. — James Madison
America stands for liberty, for the pursuit of happiness and for the unalienable right for life. This right to life cannot be granted or denied by government because it does not come from government, it comes from the creator of life. — George W. Bush
Human beings have an unalienable right to invent themselves; when that right is pre-empted it is called brain-washing. — Germaine Greer
It is to secure our rights that we resort to government at all. — Thomas Jefferson
A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate. — Thomas Jefferson
The civil rights of none, shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext infringed. — James Madison
Let no man think we can deny civil liberty to others and retain it for ourselves. When zealous agents of the Government arrest suspected "radicals" without warrant, hold them without prompt trial, deny them access to counsel and admission of bail....we have shorn the Bill of Rights of its sanctity. — Robert M. La Follette, Sr.
Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them." - Franklin D. Roosevelt — Franklin D. Roosevelt
Until COVID, I thought that free speech was a protected fundamental right guaranteed to all citizens of the United States of America by the Bill of Rights. Having been assigned core texts like 1984, Brave New World, Animal Farm, Lord of the Flies, and The Trial and Death of Socrates in fourth and fifth grade as a “gifted and talented” student in the California school system of the time, I believed there was no way anything like what was written in those books could happen here in the USA during the 21st century. — Robert W. Malone
The very purpose of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution is to protect minority rights against majority voters. Every court decision that strikes down discriminatory legislation, including past Supreme Court decisions, affirming the fundamental rights to marry the person you love, overrules a majority decision. — David Boies
Bill Maher is right to condemn religious practices that violate fundamental human rights. Religious communities must do more to counter extremist interpretations of their faith. But failing to recognize that religion is embedded in culture — and making a blanket judgment about the world’s second largest religion — is simply bigotry. — Reza Aslan
I also wish that the Pledge of Allegiance were directed at the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as it is when the President takes his oath of office, rather than to the flag and the nation — Carl Sagan
People tell me, 'Bill, let it go. The Kennedy assassination was years ago. It was just the assassination of a President and the hijacking of our government by a totalitarian regime - who cares? Just let it go.' I say, 'All right then. That whole Jesus thing? Let it go! It was 2,000 years ago! Who cares?' — Bill Hicks
An elective despotism was not the government we fought for, but one which should not only be founded on true free principles, but in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among general bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits without being effectually checked and restrained by the others. — Thomas Jefferson
We have enjoyed so much freedom for so long that we are perhaps in danger of forgetting how much blood it cost to establish the Bill of Rights. — Felix Frankfurter
Nurse: "Doctor, the man you just gave a clean bill of health to dropped dead right as he was leaving the office". Doctor: "Turn him around, make it look like he was walking in." — Henny Youngman
When we got organized as a country and we wrote a fairly radical Constitution with a radical Bill of Rights, giving a radical amount of individual freedom to Americans, it was assumed that the Americans who had that freedom would use it responsibly. — William J. Clinton
The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy. One's right to life, liberty and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly may not be submitted to vote; they depend on no elections. — Robert H. Jackson
Mr. President, passage of this bill will visit the heel of oppression on all the people, vitiate their constitutional shield against tyranny, and materially hasten the destruction of the best design for self-government yet devised by the minds of men. Its passage will mark one of the darkest days in history — Strom Thurmond
It is my belief that there are "absolutes" in our Bill of Rights, and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what words meant and meant their prohibitions to be "absolutes." — Hugo Black
The flag of the United States has not been created by rhetorical sentences in declarations of independence and in bills of rights. It has been created by the experience of a great people, and nothing is written upon it that has not been written by their life. It is the embodiment, not of a sentiment, but of a history. — Woodrow Wilson
The fundamental basis of this Nation's law was given to Moses on the Mount. The fundamental basis of our Bill of Rights comes from the teachings which we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul. — Harry S. Truman
Remember the vast majority of the Democrats as well as all the Republicans in the House of Representatives in Louisiana voted for my signature-piece of legislation in the house which was a bill, actually a bill for true civil rights. That there must be no discrimination against anyone on the basis of race in affirmative-action. — David Duke
The very purpose of a bill of rights is to withdraw certain subjects from...political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities. — Robert H. Jackson
The government was set to protect man from criminals-and the constitution was written to protect man from the government. The Bill of Rights was not directed at private citizens, but against the government-as an explicit declaration that individual rights supersede any public or social power. — Ayn Rand
No free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people, but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue. — George Mason
I went to my library, right? And I started to research the Bill of Rights and I did not technically find anything that said all Americans shall eat shrimp with whoever they like. But, I found some things that are close enough to infer that I am within my legal rights to enjoy seafood with whomever I choose. — John Mayer
The purpose of a headline is to pick out people you can interest. You wish to talk to someone in a crowd. So the first thing you say is, "hey there, Bill Jones" to get the right persons attention.so it is in n advertisement — Claude C. Hopkins
The Bill of Rights was not written to protect governments from trouble. It was written precisely to give the people the constitutional means to cause trouble for governments they no longer trusted. — Henry Steele Commager
You will never meet anyone who admires the American founders more than I do, but they were human, they made mistakes. Perhaps their worst was that their Bill of Rights stops at the border. Inside the US, the federal government has been limited. Beyond the borders, the government has been able to do anything it wanted. — Richard J. Maybury
There is danger that, if the Court does not temper its doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom, it will convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact. — Robert H. Jackson
You in the media ought to be ashamed of yourselves to call the provisions and the guarantees of the Bill of Rights 'Technicalities'. They're not. We are what we are because of those guarantees. — William J. Brennan
The Bill of Rights is a born rebel. It reeks with sedition. In every clause it shakes its fist in the face of constituted authority. It is the one guaranty of human freedom to the American people. — Frank I. Cobb
Because we hold it for 'a fundamental and undeniable truth', that religion or 'the duty which we owe to our Creator' and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence. — James Madison
The Second Amendment of our Bill of Rights is my Concealed Weapons Permit, period. — Ted Nugent
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