Top 1200 Personal Liberty Quotes & Sayings

Liberty and personal independence in America are still a concept some here have never known.

The liberty I mean is social freedom. It is that state of things in which liberty is secured by the equality of restraint. A constitution of things in which the liberty of no one man, and no body of men, and no number of men, can find means to trespass on the liberty of any person, or any description of persons, in the society. This kind of liberty is, indeed, but another name for justice.

That is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where the property which a man has in his personal safety and personal liberty, is violated by arbitrary seizures of one class of citizens for the service of the rest.

Liberty is the only idea which circulates with the human blood, in all ages, in all countries, and in all literature - liberty that is, and what cannot be separated from liberty, a love of country.

The distinguishing part of our constitution is its liberty. To preserve that liberty inviolate, is the peculiar duty and proper trust of a member of the house of commons. But the liberty, the only liberty I mean, is a liberty connected with order, and that not only exists with order and virtue, but cannot exist at all without them. It inheres in good and steady government, as in its substance and vital principle.

We built [socialistic society] for the sake of real personal liberty, liberty without quotation marks.

The loss of liberty in general would soon follow the suppression of the liberty of the press; for it is an essential branch of liberty, so perhaps it is the best preservative of the whole.

Next to the right of liberty, the right of property is the most important individual right guaranteed by the Constitution and the one which, united with that of personal liberty, has contributed more to the growth of civilization than any other institution established by the human race.

We must have constantly present in our minds the difference between independence and liberty. Liberty is a right of doing whatever the laws permit, and if a citizen could do what they forbid he would no longer be possessed of liberty.

Critics of the global warming agenda are motivated... by a love of freedom and civil liberties. They want a discussion based on logic and facts that will address any problems without depriving us of liberty and personal choice. They do not want to sacrifice our way of life based on fears of an unproven theory. After all, the loss of liberty is a greater cause of alarm than global warming.

The erosion of personal freedom and liberty as a result of federal policy and legislation is alarming.

When we think in the context of the last decade's infringements upon personal liberty and the last year's revelations, it's not about surveillance. It's about liberty.

Billionaire Michael Bloomberg, among the world's richest men, believes his personal fortune can erase the liberty of every American who would exercise the right to keep and bear arms. He plans liquidation of our rights a step-at-a-time - spending millions of dollars of his bottomless personal fortune at a time.

There are some troubles from which mankind can never escape .... have never claimed that liberty will bring perfection; they simply say that its results are vastly preferable to those that follow from authority .... As a choice of blessings, liberty is the greater; as a choice of evils, liberty is the smaller. Then liberty always says the Anarchist. No use of force except against the invader.

Tree of Liberty: A tree set up by the people, hung with flags and devices, and crowned with a cap of liberty. The Americans of the United States planted poplars and other trees during the war of independence, "as symbols of growing freedom." The Jacobins in Paris planted their first tree of liberty in 1790. The symbols used in France to decorate their trees of liberty were tricoloured ribbons, circles to indicate unity, triangles to signify equality, and a cap of liberty. Trees of liberty were planted by the Italians in the revolution of 1848.

Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible.

It has been the fashion to speak of the conflict between human rights and property rights, and from this it has come to be widely believed that the use of private property is tainted with evil and should not be espoused by rational and civilized men... the only dependable foundation of personal liberty is the personal economic security of private property. The Good Society.

There is not a truth to be gathered from history more certain, or more momentous, than this: that civil liberty cannot long be separated from religious liberty without danger, and ultimately without destruction to both. Wherever religious liberty exists, it will, first or last, bring in and establish political liberty.

Every sane man recognises that unlimited liberty is anarchy, or rather is nonentity. The civic idea of liberty is to give the citizen a province of liberty; a limitation within which a citizen is a king.

Under the law of nature, all men are born free, every one comes into the world with a right to his own person, which includes the liberty of moving and using it at his own will. This is what is called personal liberty, and is given him by the Author

I do not share the general view that market forces are the basis of personal liberty.

It is difficult for me to imagine what “personal liberty” is enjoyed by an unemployed hungry person. True freedom can only be where there is no exploitation and oppression of one person by another; where there is not unemployment, and where a person is not living in fear of losing his job, his home and his bread. Only in such a society personal and any other freedom can exist for real and not on paper.

Personal liberty is not personal license.

Personal liberty without economic liberty is an absolute contradiction; the one cannot exist without the other.

In fact, a fundamental interdependence exists between the personal right to liberty and the personal right to property.

If you like small government you need to work hard at having a strong national defense that is not so militant. Personal liberty is the purpose of government, to protect liberty - not to run your personal life, not to run the economy, and not to pretend that we can tell the world how they ought to live.

Getting up for sadhana in the morning is a totally selfish act - for personal strength, for personal intuition, for personal sharpness, for personal discipline, and overall for absolute personal prosperity.

The laws of certain states . . . give an ownership in the service of Negroes as personal property . . . . But being men, by the laws of God and nature, they were capable of acquiring liberty - and when the captor in war . . . thought fit to give them liberty, the gift was not only valid, but irrevocable.

Anarchism is for liberty, and neither for nor against anything else. Anarchy is the mother of co-operation, yes, just as liberty is the mother of order; but, as a matter of definition, liberty is not order nor is Anarchism co-operation. I define Anarchism as the belief in the greatest amount of liberty compatible with equality of liberty; or, in other words, as the belief in every liberty except the liberty to invade.

Ever since college, I have been a libertarian - socially liberal and fiscally conservative. I believe in individual liberty and personal responsibility.

The fact throughout history is that whenever government dominates the economic affairs of its citizenry, a free society is eroded, then destroyed, and a minority government ensues. Personal liberty without economic liberty is an absolute contradiction; the one cannot exist without the other.

It is not the fact of liberty but the way in which liberty is exercised that ultimately determines whether liberty itself survives.

Nothing puts peace in its proper perspective better than the loss of personal liberty first.

As liberty of thought is absolute, so is liberty of speech, which is 'inseparable' from the liberty of thought. Liberty of speech, moreover, is essential not only for its own sake but for the sake of truth, which requires absolute liberty for the utterance of unpopular and even demonstrably false opinions.

I desired liberty; for liberty I gasped; for liberty I uttered a prayer; it seemed scattered on the wind then faintly blowing.

America was founded to be a beacon of liberty, particularly religious liberty. The framers of our Constitution sought to preserve religious liberty to such an extent that they made it the first right protected in the Bill of Rights.

The sacrifice of our personal liberty for security is and will forever be a false choice.

Trade liberty for safety or money and you'll end up with neither. Liberty, like a grain of salt, easily dissolves. The power of questioning - not simply believing - has no friends. Yet liberty depends on it.

I realized that conservatism was the philosophy that best suited me, with its emphasis on individual liberty, personal responsibility, and merit.

I have always in my own thought summed up individual liberty, and business liberty, and every other kind of liberty, in the phrase that is common in the sporting world, 'A free field and no favor.'

The Statue of Liberty was never meant to be a symbol of immigration. It was meant to be a symbol of liberty and freedom. Lady Liberty is stepping forward. She is meant to be carrying the torch of liberty from the United States to the rest of the world. The torch is not to light the way to the United States. It is to light the way to liberty to the rest of the world. Lady Liberty is carrying the light of liberty to the rest of the world. It is not a beacon for immigrants to get to this country because they're tired, they're poor, they're huddled, hungry, or thirsty.

It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" is enjoyed by an unemployed person, who goes about hungry, and cannot find employment.

We built this [socialistic] society not for the curbing of personal liberty, but in order that human personalities should really feel free.

I dare not exercise personal liberty if it infringes on the liberty of others.

I've always had a strong feeling for the Statue of Liberty, because it became the statue of my personal liberty.

[A] republic . . . [is] a government, in which the property of the public, or people, and of every one of them was secure and protected by law . . . implies liberty; because property cannot be secured unless the man be at liberty to acquire, use or part with it, at his discretion, and unless he have his personal liberty of life and limb, motion and rest, for that purpose.

If each human being is to have liberty, he cannot also have the liberty to deprive others of their liberty.

Millions of people have to restore liberty and have to understand the danger and personal risk they face in a police state.

The two greatest things that all men aim at in any free government are liberty and permanency. We have had liberty enough - too much perhaps in some respects - but at all events, liberty to our hearts content.

The issue of religious liberty is absolutely critical. America was founded on three different types of liberty: political liberty, economic liberty, and religious and civil liberty. It's remarkable that, one-by-one, these strands of liberty are coming under fierce attack from the Left. And that's particularly ironic because "liberal" derives from a word which means "liberty," the free man as opposed to the slave. This liberalism which we're saddled with today isn't a real liberalism at all, but a gangster style of politics masquerading as liberalism.

True freedom is not the liberty to do anything we please, but the liberty to do what we ought; and it is genuine liberty because doing what we ought now pleases us

Upon this law, depend the natural rights of mankind, the supreme being gave existence to man, together with the means of preserving and beatifying that existence. He endowed him with rational faculties, by the help of which, to discern and pursue such things, as were consistent with his duty and interest, and invested him with an inviolable right to personal liberty, and personal safety.

The true remedy for most evils is none other than liberty, unlimited and complete liberty, liberty in every field of human endeavor.

Is the relinquishment of the trial by jury and the liberty of the press necessary for your liberty? Will the abandonment of your most sacred rights tend to the security of your liberty? Liberty, the greatest of all earlthy blessings - give us that precious jewel, and you may take every things else! . . . Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel.

Liberty is not just an idea, an abstract principle. It is power, effective power to do specific things. There is no such thing as liberty in general; liberty, so to speak, at large.

Liberty is not collective, it is personal. All liberty is individual liberty.

'Negative liberty' is a political science term meaning a liberty from government action. It is not a liberty to anything - like the liberty to meaningfully contribute to public debate or to have ample spaces for speech.

Those who won our independence... valued liberty as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.

Democracy is liberty - a liberty which does not infringe on the liberty nor encroach on the rights of others; a liberty which maintains strict discipline, and makes law its guarantee and the basis of its exercise. This alone is true liberty; this alone can produce true democracy.

It is difficult for me to imagine what "personal liberty" the unemployed can have who go hungry and cannot find utilization of their labor.