Man’s right to know, to learn, to inquire, to make bona fide errors, to investigate human emotions must, by all means, be safe, if the word “freedom” should ever be more than an empty political slogan.

You don’t have the right to hold somebody accountable for standards you refuse to apply to yourself.

The notion of obligations comes before that of rights, which is subordinate and relative to the former. A right is not effectual by itself, but only in relation to the obligation to which it corresponds, the effective exercise of a right springing not from the individual who possesses it, but from other men who consider...

A man’s only got so many yeses inside him before he uses them all up.

Prisoners, according to the law, who are non-U.S. citizens and are detained outside the U.S. – including in Guantanamo Bay – are denied ‘habeas corpus.’ They are also denied the right to claim the Geneva Conventions confer certain rights on them.

The world is littered with constitutions that have written guarantees of rights but that don’t actually deliver rights. What differentiates the ones where rights are real from where rights are fake is that it’s in the initial interests of the majority to actually deliver these rights.

The condition of women in a nation is the real measure of its progress.

After all, people seemed quite easy about having their rights and liberties taken away by those they looked up to, but somehow a space on the perch was a slap in the face, and treated as such.

In my judgment, the woman is the equal of the man. She has all the rights I have and one more, and that is the right to be protected. That is my doctrine. You are married; try and make the woman you love happy. Whoever marries simply for himself will make a mistake; but whoever...

Our civil rights have no dependence upon our religious opinions more than our opinions in physics or geometry.

Our civilization is not Christian. It does not come from the skies. It is not a result of “inspiration.” It is the child of invention, of discovery, of applied knowledge — that is to say, of science. When man becomes great and grand enough to admit that all have equal rights; when thought is untrammeled;...

This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right you claim for yourself.

Life is a balancing act. While we have all the rights to be in freedom, peace, harmony and bliss; we do have a responsibility to ensure that others too enjoy their own freedom, peace, harmony and bliss.

Today women have the rights and equality our Victorian sisters could only dream of, and with those privileges comes the responsibility of standing up and being counted.

If you don’t have the rights, you can’t do the show.

Inherent rights are from God, and the tragedies of the world originate in their attempted denial.

Property has its duties as well as its rights.

Allowing homosexuality means allowing satanic rights.

Macht macht zurecht Recht zu Un-recht.

I’ve been asked a lot for my view on American health care. Well, ‘it would be a good idea,’ to quote Gandhi.

If the thought inspires you, and it feels good and right…it is yours, alone, to exercise. So get right on it!

Rights mean you have a right to your life. You have a right to your liberty, and you should have a right to keep the fruits of your labor….I, in a way, don’t like to use those terms: gay rights, women’s rights, minority rights, religious rights. There’s only one type of right. It’s the right...

You have to remember, rights don’t come in groups we shouldn’t have ‘gay rights’; rights come as individuals, and we wouldn’t have this major debate going on. It would be behavior that would count, not what person belongs to what group.

You have been having our rights so long, that you think, like a slave-holder, that you own us. I know that it is hard for one who has held the reins for so long to give up; it cuts like a knife. It will feel all the better when it closes up again.

The peoples owe all political rights and privileges which we enjoy today in greater or lesser measure, not to the good will of their governments, but to their own strength. One need only study the history of the past three hundred years to understand by what relentless struggles every right has had to be wrested...

There is nothing in which mankind have been more unanimous [founding nations upon superstition]; yet nothing can be inferred from it more than this, that the multitude have always been credulous, and the few artful. The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature:...

When the government violates the people’s rights, insurrection is, for the people and for each portion of the people, the most sacred of the rights and the most indispensible of duties.

I think everyone must settle for what is in the parameter of their own rights. No one must have an evil intention toward the territorial benefit or integrity of other nations.

Prior to the United Nations even being formed, Palestine was a country. But the right of the Palestinian people were trampled, and unfortunately, international organizations contributed to those rights being trampled.

We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and technology, has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for...

First and foremost, I’m a feminist. And basically that stems from a strong belief that all people and creatures deserve equal opportunity, rights and respect.

A society that has no wrongs will soon have no rights.

There is no democracy in physics. We can’t say that some second-rate guy has as much right to opinion as Fermi.

This wasn’t the Dark Ages, and she wasn’t living in a third world nation where women didn’t have any rights and were treated unequally.

No true love is possible, Lewis demonstrates, until we abandon our claims, our rights, our grievances. Until then we will be trapped in the obscurity of our heart’s mixed motives, our will to possess, to control, to be our own gods.

A desire for privacy does not imply shameful secrets; Moglen argues, again and again, that without anonymity in discourse, free speech is impossible, and hence also democracy. The right to speak the truth to power does not shield the speaker from the consequences of doing so; only comparable power or anonymity can do that.

What I am is a proud humanist. Atheism says what I don’t accept, humanism says what I do.” – Nathan Phelps

People have a greater tolerance for evil than for violence. If crooked gamboling, thieving and robing are covered over folks will tolerate it longer than out right violence, even when the violence may be cleansing.

We have a tendency to sugar coat the Civil Rights movement by showing arm in arm and everyone singing ‘Kumbaya’. We don’t really always show the resistance from the government, the resistance from the status quo, from the majority to silence the movement.

Treason starts the moment when people violate their own rights.

Judges are the people who have to protect the rights of individuals, have to protect the rights of minorities, have to protect the rights in the Constitution, have to protect the requirement that the executive and the legislature not simply exercise raw power but adhere to standards of reasonableness and constitutionality.

We are on the lookout for criminal and terrorist activity but we do not – nor will we ever – monitor ideology or political beliefs. We take seriously our responsibility to protect the civil rights and liberties of the American people, including subjecting our activities to rigorous oversight from numerous internal and external sources.

Democracy is a fine thing. But that doesn’t mean citizens have a right to run riot whenever they disagree with something.#Page: 120

I’ve often observed that women can be the weakest link in women’s rights.

I think there is a puritanical wind that is blowing. I have never seen such a lack of separation between church and state in America, I don’t believe in God, but if I did I would say that sex is a Godgiven right. Otherwise it’s the end of our species.

Brand-name drugs have no competition, since the government grants them very long, exclusive marketing rights.

Peace of mind comes when we exercise our right to be honest, especially with ourselves.

You have no right to be silenced.

There are many ways to honor America. This book is mine. I have completed this journey of self-education in the belief that the most terrifying possibility since 9/11 has not been terrorism–as frightening as that is–but the prospect that Americans will give up their rights in pursuing the chimera of security.

America comes with both rights and responsibilities. You have, for example, the right to free speech, but you have the responsibility to not yell ‘fire’ in a crowded theater. If you don’t live up to that responsibility, you face certain consequences. It’s a simple but effective formula. Unfortunately, tenured professors are completely insulated from it....