The quote database

It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.

Slavery is founded in the selfishness of man's nature,--opposition to it in his love of justice.

What I do say is that no man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.

This declared indifference, but, as I must think, real, covert zeal, for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate.

If the minority will not acquiesce, the majority must, or the Government must cease.

The laws of the United States must be executed.

Our Constitution does not contain the absurdity of giving power to make laws, and another power to resist them.

The wisdom of man never yet contrived a system of taxation that would operate with perfect equality.

A State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws.

To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

We should hold our differing opinions in mutual respect, and, having submitted them to the arbitrament of the ballot, should accept an adverse judgment with the same respect that we would have demanded of our opponents if the decision had been in our favor.

The man who has come to regard the ballot box as a juggler's hat has renounced his allegiance.

They will presently themselves be compelled to appeal to the law for protection, and those who would use the law as a defense must not deny that use of it to others.

This only will I say, that the most crushing of misfortune's burdens is, that as soon as a charge is fastened upon the unhappy, they are believed to have deserved their sufferings.

My experience has been that the time to test a true gentleman is to observe him when he is in contact with individuals of a race that is less fortunate than his own.

The fact that the liberty of the press may be abused by miscreant purveyors of scandal does not make any the less necessary the immunity of the press from previous restraint in dealing with offical misconduct.

Little by little, very slowly, and with most unjust and cruel opposition, at cost of all life holds most dear, it is being gradually established by many martyrdoms that human work is woman’s as well as man’s.

To teach, to rule, to make, to decorate, to distribute,—these are not sex-functions: they are race-functions.

That any living woman should prefer it to home and husband, to love and motherhood, throws a fierce light on what women must have suffered for lack of freedom before.

There is no female mind. The brain is not an organ of sex. As well speak of a female liver.

The extravagant expenditure of public money is an evil not to be measured by the value of that money to the people who are taxed for it.

To separate them from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.

The basic concept underlying the Eighth Amendment is nothing less than the dignity of man.

When the Government acts to take away the fundamental right of citizenship, the safeguards of the Constitution should be examined with special diligence.

To the extent that a citizen's right to vote is debased, he is that much less a citizen.