“But we must not forget that in our country are evangelists and zealots of many different political, economic and religious persuasions whose fanatical conviction is that all thought is divinely classified into two kinds — that which is their own and that which is false and dangerous.”
American Communications Association v. Douds, 339 U.S. 382, 438 (1950)
Judicial opinions
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Robert H. Jackson96
American judge 1892–1954Related quotes
David Lane (white nationalist) (1938–2007) American white supremacist, convicted felon
Revolution by Number
“An economic system which can only expand or expire must be false to all that is human.”
Edward Abbey book Desert Solitaire
Source: Desert Solitaire
Edmund Burke book A Vindication of Natural Society
A Vindication of Natural Society (1756)
Context: We are indebted for all our miseries to our distrust of that guide, which Providence thought sufficient for our condition, our own natural reason, which rejecting both in human and Divine things, we have given our necks to the yoke of political and theological slavery. We have renounced the prerogative of man, and it is no wonder that we should be treated like beasts. But our misery is much greater than theirs, as the crime we commit in rejecting the lawful dominion of our reason is greater than any which they can commit. If, after all, you should confess all these things, yet plead the necessity of political institutions, weak and wicked as they are, I can argue with equal, perhaps superior, force, concerning the necessity of artificial religion; and every step you advance in your argument, you add a strength to mine. So that if we are resolved to submit our reason and our liberty to civil usurpation, we have nothing to do but to conform as quietly as we can to the vulgar notions which are connected with this, and take up the theology of the vulgar as well as their politics. But if we think this necessity rather imaginary than real, we should renounce their dreams of society, together with their visions of religion, and vindicate ourselves into perfect liberty.
Jacques Chirac (1932–2019) 22nd President of France
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4693628.stm Statement made about free speech following the publication of Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed
Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author
When asked how the world had changed following the September 11, 2001 attacks <br class="br"> Has the world changed? http://books.guardian.co.uk/writersreflections/story/0,1367,567546,00.html, The Guardian (October 11, 2001)
Andrew Dickson White (1832–1918) American politician
Source: Seven Great Statesmen in the Warfare of Humanity with Unreason (1915), p. 167
Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist
By the time our children are old enough to examine the evidence, our propaganda has closed their minds.
Source: 1930s, Power: A New Social Analysis (1938), Ch. 17: The Ethics of Power
Pope Francis (1936) 266th Pope of the Catholic Church
As quoted in Address to the UN system chief executives board for coordination, Consistory Hall (9 May 2014) http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2014/may/documents/papa-francesco_20140509_consiglio-nazioni-unite.html <br class="br">2010s, 2014