Quotes About Right To Free Speech

#1. The right to free speech is more important than the content of the speech.

Voltaire

#2. The virtue of a democratic system with a [constitutionally guaranteed right to free speech] is that it readily enables the people, over time, to be persuaded that what they took for granted is not so, and to change their laws accordingly.

Antonin Scalia

#3. In this time when a citizenry applauds the liberation of a country as it lives in fear of its own freedomwhen people all over the country fear reprisal if they use their right to free speech, it is time to get angry. It is time to get fierce.

Tim Robbins

#4. Every other basic right, such as the Formation of Government and the Right to Freedom of Organization, are simply practical extensions of the Right to Free Speech. On this law democracy stands or falls.

Stieg Larsson

#5. You have the right to free speech. We, the corporate controlled government, have the right to ignore you and we choose to exercise this right.

Steven Magee

#6. I actually think it is people like myself who have been fighting for our rights to free speech and I would like the right to defend my own right to free speech, not have soldiers doing it for me. I don't think I need soldiers.

Medea Benjamin

#7. The Founding Fathers' instructions were clear: The right to free speech includes bad speech; it means tolerance of ideas that many find obnoxious.

David Ignatius

#8. It is amazing how many people act as if the right to free speech includes the right to be free of criticism for what you say - which means that other people should not have the same right to free speech that they claim for themselves.

Thomas Sowell

#9. Women that speak against Islam are being labelled as islamophobic, as though our right to free speech is disregarded, when it comes down to an oppressive regime, which does not even recognise women as human...

Anita B. Sulser PhD

#10. Balanced' is a code for 'denied': a right to free speech that must be 'balanced' against so exhaustive a list of other supposed values means a right that can be exercised only when those in power judge that the speech in question is innocuous to them.

Ronald Dworkin

#11. Citizens United fought to defend our right to free speech - and won a great victory in the United States Supreme Court.

Marsha Blackburn

#12. I'm as keen as the next person to preserve the right to free speech.

David Blunkett

#13. The right to free speech and the unrealistic expectation to never be offended can not coexist.

Philip Sharp

#14. If our hard-earned liberty, our desire to be irreverent of the old and to question the new, can be reduced to one, basic and indispensable right, it must be the right to free speech.

Maajid Nawaz

#15. I think, with never-ending gratitude, that the young women of today do not and can never know at what price their right to free speech and to speak at all in public has been earned.

Lucy Stone

#16. The right to free speech is important but it isn't as important as 'we're all human beings together, let's find solutions together.'

Russell Brand

#17. Swedish democracy is based on a single premise: the Right to Free Speech (R.F.S.).

Stieg Larsson

#18. You know what it's like - you see someone on the train screaming awful, racist things and think, 'How can I protect this person's right to free speech?

Tony Abbott

#19. We civilians defend our own right to free speech. The military in Iraq does not defend our right to free speech.

Medea Benjamin

#20. 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

#21. There is no right not to be offended.

Mick Hume

#22. Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.

Edward Snowden

#23. That I have the right to express myself freely at all times in all circumstances entails the idea that free speech is a 'basic human right' possessed by each individual, and, as such, trumps the interests of the society or group, including my neighbour.

Tom Stoppard

#24. The political function of 'the right of free speech' is to protect dissenters and unpopular minorities from forcible suppression - not to guarantee them the support, advantages, and rewards of a popularity they have not gained.

Ayn Rand

#25. We're right to say that a culture that can't tolerate free speech is ... there are a wide range of positive human experiences that are not available in that culture. And we're right to want those experiences.

Sam Harris

#26. And a democracy can't exist without free speech and the right to assemble. And that's what Americans tend to forget. And they're born into a culture where they take all of their freedoms for granted.

Larry Flynt

#27. Free speech is the bedrock of liberty and a free society. And yes, it includes the right to blaspheme and offend.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

#28. Because I care about human beings, I want them to be free to do what is right for them. Isn't that more important than mere peace on earth? Isn't freedom, even dangerous freedom, preferable to the safest slavery, to peace bought with ignorance, cowardice, and submission?

CrimethInc.

#29. Free speech includes the right to not speak.

Jimmy Wales

#30. I am bound to accord you, in the name of free speech, the full right to shout, lie and write to your heart's content. But you are bound to grant me, in the name of freedom of association, the right to enter into, or withdraw from, association with people advocating this or that view.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

#31. The right of free speech cannot be parceled out based on whether we want to hear what the speaker has to say or whether we agree with those views. It means, quite often, tolerating the expression of views that we find distasteful, perhaps even repugnant.

Andrew Rosenthal

#32. Every man - in the development of his own personality - has the right to form his own beliefs and opinions. Hence, suppression of belief, opinion and expression is an affront to the dignity of man, a negation of man's essential nature.
[Toward a General Theory of the First Amendment (1963)]

Thomas I. Emerson

#33. But please know, whether you believe campaign contributions are speech or property, that I learned to love very dearly the right of free expression when I lived without that freedom for a while a long time ago.

John McCain

#34. However, declining interest in protest activities and campus governance should not be taken as a sign that students are uncommitted to the right of free speech or the right to demonstrate on campus. In fact, they are stronger believers in these rights than many of their predecessors.

Arthur Levine

#35. Freedom of speech is, to all Americans, as oxygen is to the human condition. It is a right that has been irreversibly programmed into our hard drive. We are free to speak our minds. An artist's right to express him or herself as best suits their art, is the artist's prerogative and it is guaranteed.

John C. McGinley

#36. Free speech is my right to say what you don't want to hear.

George Orwell

#37. There are some of us who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese or wild flowers is a right as inalienable as free speech.

Aldo Leopold

#38. When the public's right to know is threatened, and when the rights of free speech and free press are at risk, all of the other liberties we hold dear are endangered.

Christopher Dodd

#39. The Supreme Court decided that corporations are people and they have the right of free speech and the right without disclosure - all of this is through the Citizens United Supreme Court decision - to put as much money as they want into campaigns all over the country.

Bernie Sanders

#40. Not slaves," said Halyard, chuckling patronizingly. "Citizens, employed by government. They have same rights as other citizens - free speech, freedom of worship, the right to vote. Before the war, they worked in the Ilium Works, controlling machines, but now machines control themselves much better.

Anonymous

#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 have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.

G.K. Chesterton

#43. Free speech means the right to shout 'theatre' in a crowded fire.

Abbie Hoffman

#44. Aside from the collective gain that comes from that free interchange of ideas, there is a direct personal value for the individual concerned. Each of us should have the right to speak his thoughts and to hear the thoughts of others ...

Charles Rembar

#45. The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously.

Hubert H. Humphrey

#46. Aggressive civil disobedience should be confined to a vindication of the right of free speech and free association.

Mahatma Gandhi

#47. The fact that we're protected under that Constitution in exercising the right of free speech, it's a wonderful thing. You've got to come from somewhere else to realize how valuable it is.

Pat Oliphant

#48. Free speech is the cornerstone to every right we have.

Mark Thomas