What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don't like something to saying that the government should forbid it. When you go down that road, don't expect freedom to survive very long.
If you are not free to choose wrongly and irresponsibly, you are not free at all.
A right is not what someone gives you; it's what no one can take from you.
Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.
Vices are simply the errors which a man makes in his search after his own happiness. Unlike crimes, they imply no malice toward others, and no interference with their persons or property.
First they came for the Jews, but I did nothing because I'm not a Jew. Then they came for the socialists, but I did nothing because I'm not a socialist. Then they came for the Catholics, but I did nothing because I'm not a Catholic. Finally, they came for me, but by then there was no one left to help me.
Those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
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.
It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones.
You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
Men are most apt to believe what they least understand.
Alcohol didn't cause the high crime rates of the '20s and '30s, Prohibition did. And drugs do not cause today's alarming crime rates, but drug prohibition does.
The Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions
The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.
It would be thought a hard government that should tax its people one tenth part.
The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be unlawful for them to do themselves.
In order to become the master, the politician poses as the servant.
It is not the business of government to make men virtuous or religious, or to preserve the fool from the consequences of his own folly. Government should be repressive no further than is necessary to secure liberty by protecting the equal rights of each from aggression on the part of others, and the moment governmental prohibitions extend beyond this line they are in danger of defeating the very ends they are intended to serve.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.
