“What is a public meeting? It is not an anarchical combination—it is not a mob—it is an assemblage of rational beings to which, if the invitation be general, every man has a right to go, and the Government reporter has a right to go, but only like others and subject to the ordinary law. But if instead of appealing to the promoters of the meeting…to afford the Government reporter facilities, if instead of that the method of violence is resorted to, then I say the law was broken by the agents of the law. It is idle to speak to the Irish people of the duty of obeying the law, or to bring in Coercion Bills to make them obey the law, if the very Government that so speaks and that brings in these Bills has agents who violate the law by violently breaking up orderly public meetings, and who are sustained by the Ministers of the Crown in this illegal action.”

— William Ewart Gladstone

Speech in Nottingham (18 October 1887) referring to the Mitchelstown Massacre, quoted in The Times (19 October 1887), p. 6.
1880s

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "What is a public meeting? It is not an anarchical combination—it is not a mob—it is an assemblage of rational beings to…" by William Ewart Gladstone?

William Ewart Gladstone121

British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United… 1809–1898

Related quotes

“Our laws are being disregarded right and left. The mobs are out. The police are being subjected to violence. Intimidation and violence are contrary to the law of the land. It should be condemned by every responsible citizen. We have the finest police force in the world. It is under the Queen that they defend our laws, and it is under the Queen that we should support them.”

Alfred Denning, Baron Denning (1899–1999) British judge

Speech to Justice, London (28 June 1977), quoted in The Times (29 June 1977), p. 4

“Property is not a natural and divine, but conventional right; it is the mere creature of society and law… if private property generally were so used to injure, instead of promote public good, then society might and ought to destroy the whole institution.”

George Fitzhugh (1806–1881) American activist

Source: Sociology For The South: Or The Failure Of A Free Society (1854), p. 185

“Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On the one hand the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think: every effort we can make to throw off our subjection, will serve but to demonstrate and confirm it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their empire: but in reality he will remain subject to it all the while. The principle of utility recognizes this subjection, and assumes it for the foundation of that system, the object of which is to rear the fabric of felicity by the hands of reason and of law. Systems which attempt to question it, deal in sounds instead of sense, in caprice instead of reason, in darkness instead of light.”

Jeremy Bentham book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation

Source: An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789; 1823), Ch. 1 : Of the Principle of Utility

“The internet has no government, no constitution, no laws, no rights, no police, no courts. Don't talk about fairness or innocence, and don't talk about what should be done. Instead, talk about what is being done and what will be done by the amorphous unreachable undefinable blob called the internet user base.”

Paul Vixie (1963) American internet pioneer

NANOG mailing list http://www.mail-archive.com/nanog@merit.edu/msg00981.html (2004)

“Every other method of resolving this difference of opinion has failed. We are reduced to violence, which is the last resort.”

Jane Rogers book The Testament of Jessie Lamb

Source: The Testament of Jessie Lamb (2011), Chapter 10 (p. 75)

“The other philosophy of government is based on creation, which says laws come from the Creator, rights are unalienable, and government should be limited. That's called a republic.”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

Creation seminars (2003-2005), The Garden of Eden

“And the law says, better is a mischief than an inconvenience. By a mischief is meant, when one man or some few men suffer by the hardship of a law, which law is yet useful for the public. But an inconvenience is to have a public law disobeyed or broken, or an offence to go unpunished.”

Robert Atkyns (judge) (1621–1710) Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer and Speaker of the House of Lords

11 How. St. Tr. 1208.
Trial of Sir Edward Hales (1686)

“Every law is an evil, for every law is an infraction of liberty: And I repeat that government has but a choice of evils”

Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) British philosopher, jurist, and social reformer

Principles of Legislation (1830), Ch. X : Analysis of Political Good and Evil; How they are spread in society
Context: It is with government, as with medicine. They have both but a choice of evils. Every law is an evil, for every law is an infraction of liberty: And I repeat that government has but a choice of evils: In making this choice, what ought to be the object of the legislator? He ought to assure himself of two things; 1st, that in every case, the incidents which he tries to prevent are really evils; and 2ndly, that if evils, they are greater than those which he employs to prevent them.
There are then two things to be regarded; the evil of the offence and the evil of the law; the evil of the malady and the evil of the remedy.
An evil comes rarely alone. A lot of evil cannot well fall upon an individual without spreading itself about him, as about a common centre. In the course of its progress we see it take different shapes: we see evil of one kind issue from evil of another kind; evil proceed from good and good from evil. All these changes, it is important to know and to distinguish; in this, in fact, consists the essence of legislation.

“The God Spinoza revered is my God, too: I meet Him everyday in the harmonious laws which govern the universe.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Source: Attributed in posthumous publications, Einstein and the Poet (1983), p. 89
Context: The God Spinoza revered is my God, too: I meet Him everyday in the harmonious laws which govern the universe. My religion is cosmic, and my God is too universal to concern himself with the intentions of every human being. I do not accept a religion of fear; My God will not hold me responsible for the actions that necessity imposes. My God speaks to me through laws.

“So I think this is going to be a really interesting and really weird reunion, because it looks like our generation has become some sort of bragging hipster generation. Instead of bragging about money and fame like traditional people do, we're way too cool for that and instead we're all high on ourselves for being good people with the right priorities in life.”

Holden Karnofsky (1981) American nonprofit executive

In his 2013 speech http://www.harvard03.com/holdens-2013-presentation-video at the Harvard class of 2003 reunion, June 2013 <br class="br">Context: But on the other hand, there are a couple of dimensions where [Harvard] alumni have much higher opinions of themselves, and these are the things I think people have come to humblebrag about. One of them is positive contribution to society: 15% of us think we're in the top 10%, and 4% of us think we're in the top 1%. The much bigger one is happiness: only 4% of us think we're below average, over 30% of us think we're in the happiest 10%, and a whopping 10% of us think we're in the happiest one percent. So I think this is going to be a really interesting and really weird reunion, because it looks like our generation has become some sort of bragging hipster generation. Instead of bragging about money and fame like traditional people do, we're way too cool for that and instead we're all high on ourselves for being good people with the right priorities in life. I think we're going to be hearing a lot of conversations along the lines of "Yeah I'm kinda poor, but I'm doing what I believe in and I'm really happy and I think that's just what matters, but I don't know, maybe that's just me." "No man I totally feel you, and actually I think I'm even poorer and happier, I mean I literally love my spouse so much I'd kill myself if we split up."

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

William Ewart Gladstone121

Related quotes

Related topics