“The relationship between governments and the press has always been recognized as a matter of large importance. Wherever despotism abounds, the sources of public information are the first to be brought under its control. Whereever the cause of liberty is making its way, one of its highest accomplishments is the guarantee of the freedom of the press. It has always been realized, sometimes instinctively, oftentimes expressly, that truth and freedom are inseparable. An absolutism could never rest upon anything save a perverted and distorted view of human relationships and upon false standards set up and maintained by force. It has always found it necessary to attempt to dominate the entire field of education and instruction. It has thrived on ignorance. While it has sought to train the minds of a few, it has been largely with the purpose of attempting to give them a superior facility for misleading the many. Men have been educated under absolutism, not that they might bear witness to the truth, but that they might be the more ingenious advocates and defenders of false standards and hollow pretenses. This has always been the method of privilege, the method of class and caste, the method of master and slave.”

—  Calvin Coolidge

1920s, The Press Under a Free Government (1925)

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 "The relationship between governments and the press has always been recognized as a matter of large importance. Wherever…" by Calvin Coolidge?
Calvin Coolidge photo
Calvin Coolidge 412
American politician, 30th president of the United States (i… 1872–1933

Related quotes

George Mason photo

“The freedom of the press is one of the great bulwarks of liberty, and can never be restrained but by despotic governments.”

George Mason (1725–1792) American delegate from Virginia to the U.S. Constitutional Convention

Article 12
Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776)

Jeff Flake photo

“Every word that a president utters projects American values around the world. The values of free expression and a reverence for the free press have been our global hallmark, for it is our ability to freely air the truth that keeps our government honest and keeps a people free. Between the mighty and the modest, truth is the great leveler. And so, respect for freedom of the press has always been one of our most important exports.”

Jeff Flake (1962) American politician

Farewell speech to the U.S. Senate (2018)

Andrei Sakharov photo

“Freedom of conscience, the existence of an informed public opinion, a system of education of a pluralist nature, freedom of the press, and access to other sources of information, all these are in very short supply in the socialist countries.”

Andrei Sakharov (1921–1989) Soviet nuclear physicist and human rights activist

Nobel Peace Prize Speech (1975)

Harold Innis photo

“The full impact of printing did not become possible until the adoption of the Bill of Rights in the United States with its guarantee of freedom of the press. A guarantee of freedom of the press in print was intended to further sanctify the printed word and to provide a rigid bulwark for the shelter of vested interests.”

Harold Innis (1894–1952) Canadian professor of political economy

Industrialism and Cultural Values p. 138.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

Emil M. Cioran photo

“What we want is not freedom but its appearances. It is for these simulacra that man has always striven. And since freedom, as has been said, is no more than a sensation, what difference is there between being free and believing ourselves free?”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

On the Heights of Despair (1934)

Charles Evans Hughes photo

“The liberty of the press is not confined to newspapers and periodicals. It necessarily embraces pamphlets and leaflets. … the press in its historic connotation comprehends every sort of publication which affords a vehicle of information and opinion.”

Charles Evans Hughes (1862–1948) American judge

Lovell v. City of Griffin, 303 U.S. 444 (1938).
Judicial opinions

Selahattin Demirtaş photo

“Only the democratic struggle of the people for their own freedom will free Turkey from authoritarianism and fear and free its institutions — the judiciary and the press — from tutelary control by the government.”

Selahattin Demirtaş (1973) Turkish Kurdish politician

I Am Running for President in Turkey. From My Prison Cell. (2018)

A. J. Liebling photo

“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”

A. J. Liebling (1904–1963) American journalist

The New Yorker, May 14, 1960.

H.L. Mencken photo

“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

A. J. Liebling, in "Do you belong in journalism?", The New Yorker (14 May 1960); sometimes paraphrased : Freedom of press is limited to those who own one.
Misattributed

“[There has been] a widening of the field covered by the concept of “information”, both its theory and its practice. Information transfer has been put on a par with the transfer of matter and energy, as one of the primary natural processes.’”

Brian Campbell Vickery (1918–2009) British information theorist

Source: Fifty years of information progress (1994), p. 7: Introduction.

Related topics