“With thinking men, the question can never arise, who ought to be free? Because no one ought to be free. All government is slavery.”

—  George Fitzhugh

Source: Sociology For The South: Or The Failure Of A Free Society (1854), p. 170

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 "With thinking men, the question can never arise, who ought to be free? Because no one ought to be free. All government …" by George Fitzhugh?
George Fitzhugh photo
George Fitzhugh 52
American activist 1806–1881

Related quotes

Thomas Jefferson photo

“No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Letter to George Washington (9 September 1792)
1790s

John Adams photo

“There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.”

John Adams (1735–1826) 2nd President of the United States

Notes for an oration at Braintree (Spring 1772)
1770s

Anatole France photo

“No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free, none ever will.”

Anatole France (1844–1924) French writer

No government ought to be without censors: & where the press is free, no one ever will.
Thomas Jefferson, letter http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/P/tj3/writings/brf/jefl100.htm to George Washington (9 September 1792)
Misattributed

John Adams photo

“Yesterday the greatest question was decided which ever was debated in America; and a greater perhaps never was, nor will be, decided among men. A resolution was passed without one dissenting colony, "that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States."”

John Adams (1735–1826) 2nd President of the United States

On the decision to proclaim independence from British rule, which was made on 2 July 1776, in a letter to Abigail Adams (3 July 1776), published in The Adams Papers: Adams Family Correspondence (2007) edited by Margaret A. Hogan
1770s

James Russell Lowell photo

“To be told that we ought not to agitate the question of Slavery, when it is that which is forever agitating us, is like telling a man with the fever and ague on him to stop shaking and he will be cured. The discussion of Slavery is said to be dangerous, but dangerous to what?…Discussion is the very life of free institutions, the fruitful mother of all political and moral enlightenment, and yet the question of all questions must be tabooed.”

James Russell Lowell (1819–1891) American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat

The Election in November 1860 (1860)

John Quincy Adams photo

“The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. ”

John Quincy Adams (1767–1848) American politician, 6th president of the United States (in office from 1825 to 1829)
Hubert H. Humphrey photo

“The story of the labor movement needs to be taught in every school in this land… America is a living testimonial to what free men and women, organized in free democratic trade unions can do to make a better life … we ought to be proud of it!”

Hubert H. Humphrey (1911–1978) Vice-President of the USA under Lyndon B. Johnson

Address to the 1977 Minnesota State AFL-CIO Convention.

Charles E. Nash photo

“A government which cannot protect its humblest citizens from outrage and injury is unworthy of the name and ought not to command the support of a free people.”

Charles E. Nash (1844–1913) American politician

As quoted in Congressional Record https://web.archive.org/web/20160528155427/http://history.house.gov/People/Detail/18846, House, 44th Cong., 1st sess. (7 June 1876): pp. 3,667–3,668
Speech to the U.S. House of Representatives (1876)

Jacques Ellul photo

“It seems to me that the free man, i.e., the man freed in Christ, ought to take part in all movements that aim at human freedom. He obviously ought to oppose all dictatorship and oppression and all the fatalities which crush man. The Christian cannot bear it that others should be slaves. His great passion in the world ought to be a passion for the liberation of men.”

Jacques Ellul (1912–1994) French sociologist, technology critic, and Christian anarchist

Source: The Ethics of Freedom (1973 - 1974), p. 398

Dick Cheney photo

“With respect to the question of relationships, my general view is that freedom means freedom for everyone. People…ought to be free to enter into any kind of relationship they want to.”

Dick Cheney (1941) American politician and businessman

Remarks on same same-sex marriage Washington Post http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29862-2004Aug24.html (25 August 2004)
2000s, 2004

Related topics