Top 100 Quotes About Press Freedom
#1. Press freedom does not mean that the press should be above the law. While it's vital that a free press can tell truth to power, it is equally important that those in power can tell truth to the press.
David Cameron
#2. Press Freedom will never be under threat in South Africa for as long as the ANC is the majority party
Nelson Mandela
#3. There is an attempt to tarnish Turkey by using press freedom when it is in fact measures taken against terrorism, i dispute this. Nowhere in Europe or in other countries is there a media that is as free as the press in Turkey.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan
#4. If investors are willing to fund the U.S. deficit, why wouldn't investors want to fund the press freedom deficit?
Sasa Vucinic
#5. The Obama administration has been curtailing press freedom - but that hasn't ended the press' drool-cup worship for their beloved president.
Ben Shapiro
#6. the current limits on press freedom and excessive government secrecy make it impossible for Americans to grasp fully what is happening in the wars we finance.
Mickey Huff
#7. We don't have an Official Secrets Act in the United States, as other countries do. Under the First Amendment, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and freedom of association are more important than protecting secrets.
Alan Dershowitz
#8. Much as constitutional guarantees of press freedom do little good for prospective publishers if they do not have access to paper or ink, the right to aid in dying is strikingly useless if nobody is willing to help.
Jacob M. Appel
#9. Freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of person under protection of habeas corpus; and trial by juries impartially selected, these principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation.
Thomas Jefferson
#10. To prosper, a zoo needs parliamentary government, democratic elections, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of association, rule of law and everything else enshrined in India's Constitution. Impossible to enjoy the animals otherwise. Long-term, bad politics is bad for business.
Yann Martel
#11. I don't think that there is absolute freedom of the press. We operate under laws - against libel, for instance. The idea that there is some absolute press freedom is kind of a myth.
Bill Keller
#12. Freedom of the press, freedom of association, the inviolability of domicile, and all the rest of the rights of man are respected so long as no one tries to use them against the privileged class. On the day they are launched against the privileged they are overthrown.
Peter Kropotkin
#13. They cry press freedom, but (the raids) have nothing to do with it, we have no concern about what the EU might say, whether the EU accepts us as members or not, we have no such concern. Please keep your wisdom to yourself.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan
#14. Every generation has to protect every one of their rights, whether that's freedom of the press, freedom of speech, or freedom of faith. You have to remain diligent.
James Lankford
#15. Freedom of the press, the surest guaranty of the rights of man.
Sarah Vowell
#16. We have freedom of the press; I think it's guaranteed in the Constitution or something." The
Morgan Llywelyn
#17. I'm not a big fan of regulation: anyone who likes freedom of the press can't be.
Julian Assange
#18. The more I view the independence of the press in its principal effects, the more I convince myself that among the moderns the independence of the press is the capital and so to speak the constitutive element of freedom.
Alexis De Tocqueville
#19. Montrose decided then and there that a full library, one made of old-fashioned paper books with bindings, the kind that cannot be electronically re-edited by anonymous lines of hidden code, was just as much a necessity for a free man as a shooting iron or a printing press.
John C. Wright
#20. When I began we did not really have a lot of First Amendment law. It is really surprising to think of it this way, but a lot of the law - most of the law that relates to the First Amendment freedom of the press in America - is really within living memory.
Floyd Abrams
#21. Family ownership provides the independence that is sometimes required to withstand governmental pressure and preserve freedom of the press.
Katharine Graham
#22. The arbitrary power of the Government is unlimited, and unexampled in history; freedom of the Press, of opinion and of movement are as thoroughly exterminated as though the proclamation of the Rights of Man had never been.
Arthur Koestler
#23. The Negro has no room to make any substantial compromises because his store of advantages is too small. He must press unrelentingly for quality, integrated education or his whole drive for freedom will be undermined by the absence of a most vital and indispensable element - learning.
Martin Luther King Jr.
#24. The murders in Paris are sickening, we stand with the French people in the fight against terror and defending the freedom of the press.
David Cameron
#25. All Americans value the freedom of speech and the freedom of the press, and I believe this is essential for our continued way of life. But with this freedom comes responsibility.
Steven Hatfill
#26. The price of freedom of religion or of speech or of the press is that we must put up with, and even pay for, a good deal of rubbish.
Robert H. Jackson
#27. The liberty of the press, trial by jury, the Habeas Corpus Writ, even Magna Carta itself, although justly deemed the paladia of freedom, are all inferior considerations, when compared with the general distribution of real property among every class of people.
Noah Webster
#28. Considering the great importance to the public liberty of the freedom of the press, and the difficulty of submitting it to very precise rules, the laws have thought it less mischievous to give greater scope to its freedom than to the restraint of it.
Thomas Jefferson
#29. It is the press, above all, which wages a positively fanatical and slanderous struggle, tearing down everything which can be regarded as a support of national independence, cultural elevation, and the economic independence of the nation.
Adolf Hitler
#30. Freedom of press and freedom of speech: What a blessing for a country while in the hands of honest, patriotic men; what a curse if in the hands of designing demagogues.
William J.H. Boetcker
#31. If you think there is freedom of the press in the United States, I tell you there is no freedom of the press ... They come out with the cheap shot. The press should be ashamed of itself. They should come to both sides of the issue and hear both sides and let the American people make up their minds
Bill Moyers
#32. When one makes a Revolution, one cannot mark time; one must always go forward - or go back. He who now talks about the 'freedom of the press' goes backward, and halts our headlong course towards Socialism.
Vladimir Lenin
#33. Routine is a declivity down which many governments slide, and routine says that freedom of the press is dangerous.
Jose Rizal
#34. Freedom of the press is essential to the preservation of a democracy; but there is a difference between freedom and license. Editorialists who tell downright lies in order to advance their own agendas do more to discredit the press than all the censors in the world.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
#35. To get the inestimable good that freedom of the press assures one must know how to submit to the inevitable evil it gives rise to.
Alexis De Tocqueville
#36. How the press, for example, loves to brag to its victims - its readers - about its freedom. Yes, the press may be free to lie and distort and suppress and deceive and malign, but is it free to tell the truth?
Willis Carto
#37. Let every
writer
tell his
own
lies
That's freedom
of the
press.
Norman Mailer
#38. A free and truly independent press - fiercely independent when necessary - is the red beating heart of freedom and democracy.
Dan Rather
#39. The freedom of the press works in such a way that there is not much freedom from it.
Grace Kelly
#40. Freedom of the press is not questioned when investigative journalism unearths scandals, But that does not mean that every classified state document should be made available to journalists.
Otto Schily
#41. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
U.S. Congress
#42. To preserve the freedom of the human mind then and freedom of the press, every spirit should be ready to devote itself to martyrdom; for as long as we may think as we will, and speak as we think, the condition of man will proceed in improvement
Thomas Jefferson
#43. The foreign press seems obsessed with the Freedom Tower, as if it was the only thing going on here. In fact, we're trying to keep a huge juggling act in balance, with the tower as just one of the many balls in play.
Daniel Libeskind
#44. The tips of my overgrown bangs
dip into the wet of my tears.
My fingers, forehead, moisten with sweat.
I fight the slipperiness, press the valves firmly,
play the love, the hate,
the misery, the hope,
the freedom that I wanted, never wanted, can't have;
that doesn't exist.
Stasia Ward Kehoe
#45. You can't pick and choose which types of freedom you want to defend. You must defend all of it or be against all of it.
Scott Howard Phillips
#46. A free press can, of course, be good or bad, but, most certainly without freedom, the press will never be anything but bad.
Albert Camus
#47. Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.
Thomas Jefferson
#48. Freedom of the press is perhaps the freedom that has suffered the most from the gradual degradation of the idea of liberty.
Albert Camus
#49. Napoleon is great because he rose superior to the Revolution, suppressed its abuses, preserved all that was good in it - equality of citizenship and freedom of speech and of the press - and only for that reason did he obtain power.
Leo Tolstoy
#50. Freedom of the press is a precious privilege that no country can forego.
Mahatma Gandhi
#51. I am ... for freedom of the press, and against all violations of the Constitution to silence by force and not by reason the complaints or criticisms, just or unjust, of our citizens against the conduct of their agents.
Thomas Jefferson
#52. Freedom of the press is the staff of life, for any vital democracy.
Wendell Willkie
#53. Freedom of the press is the mortar that binds together the bricks of democracy
and it is also the open window embedded in those bricks.
Shashi Tharoor
#54. We now live in a nation where doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, governments destroy freedom, the press destroys information, religion destroys morals, and our banks destroy the economy.
Chris Hedges
#55. Absolute freedom of the press to discuss public questions is a foundation stone of American liberty.
Herbert Hoover
#56. Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.
A.J. Liebling
#57. I'm an artist, and I go in the studio and make my music. And then I'll give it to my dad and he does what he does. And he does, you know, the press, and figuring out shows and whatnot. When it comes to my artistic freedom, he doesn't, like, step on my toes or anything.
Ashlee Simpson
#58. Press releases tell us when federal agencies do something right, but the Freedom of Information Act lets us know when they do not.
Patrick Leahy
#59. Town after town has but one newspaper or one radio station. It is often owned by Murdoch. Yes, we don't have as much freedom of the press as we think we have - although the traditional freedom of speech is strongly rooted in American culture.
Pete Seeger
#60. Nothing's riding on this, except the First Amendment to the Constitution, freedom of the press and maybe the future of the country. Not that any of that matters, but if you guys f-k up again, I'm gonna get mad.
Ben Bradlee
#61. Our democracy depends on an informed citizenry to survive, Your Honor. Besides the advancement of truth, science and morality in general, the freedom of the press is a backbone of democracy. It exists to keep the government transparent, and the human instruments of government honest.
Kenneth Eade
#62. The freedom of the press is one of the great bulwarks of liberty, and can never be restrained but by despotic governments.
George Mason
#63. Without general elections, without unrestricted freedom of press and assembly, without a free struggle of opinion, life dies out in every public institution, becomes a mere semblance of life, in which only the bureaucracy remains as the active element.
Rosa Luxemburg
#64. All the wrong people have the power of suggestion and the freedom of the press is meaningless if nobody asks a question.
Ani DiFranco
#65. If the true freedom of the press is to decide for itself what to publish and when to publish it, the true responsibility of the press must be to assert and defend that freedom ... What the press in America needs is less inhibition, not more restraint.
Tom Wicker
#66. It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.
Mark Lloyd
#67. Criticism of government finds sanctuary in several portions of the 1st Amendment. It is part of the right of free speech. It embraces freedom of the press.
Hugo Black
#68. The First Amendment does not guarantee the press a constitutional right of special access to information not available to the general public, nor does it cloak the inmate with special rights of freedom of speech.
Pete Wilson
#69. Some of the press who speak loudly about the freedom of the press are themselves the enemies of freedom. Countless people dare not say a thing because they know it will be picked up and made a song of by the press. That limits freedom.
Geoffrey Fisher
#70. I had my first amendment rights removed by a USA judge for a video that I recorded in the public sidewalk. The right to free speech and freedom of the press only partially exists in the USA.
Steven Magee
#71. 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
#72. It is well to remember that freedom through the press is the thing that comes first. Most of us probably feel we couldn't be free without newspapers, and that is the real reason we want the newspapers to be free.
Edward R. Murrow
#73. Since Castro took power, the Cuban people have been denied basic human freedoms. No freedom of religion, no freedom of the press, no political freedom. And the regime uses brutality and violence to suppress these freedoms and impose its will.
Mitt Romney
#74. I think future generations will see the invention of the Internet as having been as important as the invention of the printing press. It's the democratizing tool of all tools. As long as no one can control the flow of information, then freedom always has a chance.
Marianne Williamson
#75. Be passionate about what you write, believe in your ability to convey timeless ideas, and let no one tell you what what you're capable of.
Christina Westover
#76. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.
Hugo Black
#77. Freedom of the press is not just important to democracy, it is democracy.
Walter Cronkite
#78. The liberty of the press is not confined to newspapers and periodicals. It necessarily embraces pamphlets and leaflets. These indeed have been historic weapons in the defense of liberty, as the pamphlets of Thomas Paine and others in our history abundantly attest.
Charles Evans Hughes
#79. Freedom of the press and also of speech, assembly, and worship can persist as social forms and legal guarantees, while at the same time their functional realities can be gradually slipping away.
Marshall Field
#81. As someone who is in awe and grateful every day to be in a country where freedom of the press, free speech and free elections are a way of life, I am wowed, amazed and excited by the opportunity to moderate a 2012 presidential debate.
Candy Crowley
#82. We must do away with all newspapers. A revolution cannot be accomplished with freedom of the press.
Che Guevara
#83. Slavery tolerates no freedom of the press, no freedom of speech, no freedom of opinion.
Hinton Rowan Helper
#84. And so it is to the printing press
to the recorder of man's deeds, the keeper of his conscience, the courier of his news
that we look for strength and assistance, confident that with your help man will be what he was born to be: free and independent.
John F. Kennedy
#85. Free thought, free speech and a free press.
Anne Royall
#86. I get a little nauseated, perhaps, when I hear the phrase 'freedom of the press' used as freely as it is, knowing that a large part of our proprietorial press is not free at all.
Harold Wilson
#87. In the long, fierce struggle for freedom of opinion, the press, like the Church, counted its martyrs by thousands.
James A. Garfield
#88. Free speech and freedom of the press are under attack in the U.K. I cannot return to England, my country, because of my journalistic work with NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and at WikiLeaks. There are things I feel I cannot even write.
Sarah Harrison
#89. Say what you wish about media in the Arab world, but say it knowing that no media channel in the world is absolutely free.
Aysha Taryam
#90. What have the Germans gained by their boasted freedom of the press, except the liberty of abusing each other as they like?
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
#91. Freedom of the Press, if it means anything at all, means the freedom to criticize and oppose
George Orwell
#92. Though not really a comedy, 'Rosewater' is a demonstration of the creed behind 'The Daily Show': belief in the crucial need for impious wit against entrenched power. The freedom of the press is also the freedom to depress - and to inspire. That's a message that can outlive any Oscar season.
Richard Corliss
#93. I am a passionate believer in freedom of speech. I would not support anything which would impinge on aggressive robust freedom of the British press, but when things go wrong and there has been outright illegality, there should be proper accountability.
Nick Clegg
#94. We have more freedom of the press than any other country in a similar position. Even way back in the frightened '50s, Communists, for example, could publish their magazine. The KKK published their own books. But face it, the mass media is controlled by money.
Pete Seeger
#95. Our parents, our children, our spouses, and our friends will continue to press every button we have, until we realize what it is that we don't want to know about ourselves, yet. They will point us to our freedom every time.
Byron Katie
#96. There are laws to protect the freedom of the press's speech, but none that are worth anything to protect the people from the press
Mark Twain
#97. Freedom of speech and the press must be complete. But then freedom of association must be complete too.
Vladimir Lenin
#98. The bourgeoisie is many times stronger than we. To give it the weapon of freedom of the press is to ease the enemy's cause, to help the class enemy. We do not desire to end in suicide, so we will not do this.
Vladimir Lenin
#99. Despotism and freedom of the press cannot exist together.
Leon Gambetta
#100. The heaviest restriction upon the freedom of public opinion is not the official censorship of the Press, but the unofficial censorship by a Press which exists not so much to express opinion as to manufacture it.
Dorothy L. Sayers
