Hugo Black
It is the paradox of life that the way to miss pleasure is to seek it first. The very first condition of lasting happiness is that a life should be full of purpose, aiming at something outside self.Collection: Happiness
In my view, far from deserving condemnation for their courageous reporting, the New York Times, the Washington Post and other newspapers should be commended for serving the purpose that the Founding Fathers saw so clearly.Collection: History
The Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to bare the secrets of government and inform the people.Collection: Government
When I was 40, my doctor advised me that a man in his 40s shouldn't play tennis. I heeded his advice carefully and could hardly wait until I reached 50 to start again.Collection: Sports
Paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell.
Laws are made to protect the trusting as well as the suspicious.
The layman's constitutional view is that what he likes is constitutional and that which he doesn't like is unconstitutional.
The Framers of the Constitution knew that free speech is the friend of change and revolution. But they also knew that it is always the deadliest enemy of tyranny.
A union of government and religion tends to destroy government and degrade religion.
Our Constitution was not written in the sands to be washed away by each wave of new judges blown in by each successive political wind.
Criticism of government finds sanctuary in several portions of the 1st Amendment. It is part of the right of free speech. It embraces freedom of the press.
In revealing the workings of government that led to the Vietnam War, the newspapers nobly did precisely that which the Founders hoped and trusted they would do.
The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people.Collection: Responsibility
The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.Collection: Freedom Of The Press
The Government's power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the Government. The press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government.Collection: Peace
There can be no equal justice where the kind of trial a man gets depends on the amount of money he has.Collection: Men
The First Amendment's language leaves no room for inference that abridgments of speech and press can be made just because they are slight. That Amendment provides, in simple words, that "Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press." I read "no law . . . abridging" to mean no law abridging.Collection: Mean
A union of government and religion tends to destroy government and to degrade religion.Collection: Government
Freedom of speech means that you shall not do something to people either for the views they have, or the views they express, or the words they speak or write.Collection: Freedom
The very reason for the First Amendment is to make the people of this country free to think, speak, write and worship as they wish, not as the Government commands.Collection: Country
I do not believe that it can be too often repeated that the freedoms of speech, press, petition and assembly guaranteed by the First Amendment must be accorded to the ideas we hate or sooner or later they will be denied to the ideas we cherish. The first banning of an association because it advocates hated ideas - whether that association be called a political party or not - marks a fateful moment in the history of a free country.Collection: Country
The Establishment Clause stands as an expression of principle on the part of the Founders of our Constitution that religion is too personal, too sacred, too holy, to permit its 'unhallowed perversion' by a civil magistrate.Collection: Expression
I cannot agree with those who think of the Bill of Rights as an 18th century straitjacket, unsuited for this age...The evils it guards against are not only old, they are with us now, they exist today.Collection: Gun
The public welfare demands that constitutional cases must be decided according to the terms of the Constitution itself, and not according to judges views of fairness, reasonableness, or justice. I have no fear of constitutional amendments properly adopted, but I do fear the rewriting of the Constitution by judges under the guise of interpretation.Collection: Views
It is my belief that there are "absolutes" in our Bill of Rights, and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what words meant and meant their prohibitions to be "absolutes."Collection: Men
The Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to... bare the secrets of government and inform the people.Collection: Father
Laws are made to protect the trusting as well as the suspiciousCollection: Law
An unconditional right to say what one pleases about public affairs is what I consider to be the minimum guarantee of the First Amendment.Collection: Religious
I am for the First Amendment from the first word to the last. I believe it means what it says.Collection: Believe
Words uttered under coercion are proof of loyalty to nothing but self-interest. Love of country must spring from willing hearts and free minds.Collection: Loyalty
The very first condition of lasting happiness is that a life should be full of purpose, aiming at something outside self.Collection: Self
[I]t is true that [the provisions of the Bill of Rights] were designed to meet ancient evils. But they are the same kind of human evils that have emerged from century to century whenever excessive power is sought by the few at the expense of the many.Collection: Rights
No higher duty, or more solemn responsibility, rests upon this Court than that of translating into living law and maintaining this constitutional shield deliberately planned and inscribed for the benefit of every human being subject to our Constitution - of whatever race, creed or persuasion.Collection: Life
The word 'security' is a broad, vague generality whose contours should not be invoked to abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment. The guarding of military and diplomatic secrets at the expense of informed representative government provides no real security.Collection: Military
From the very beginning, our state and national constitutions and laws have laid great emphasis on procedural and substantive safeguards designed to assure fair trials before impartial tribunals in which every defendant stands equal before the law. This noble ideal cannot be realized if the poor man charged with crime has to face his accusers without a lawyer to assist him.Collection: Men
In my view, far from deserving condemnation for their courageous reporting, The New York Times, The Washington Post and other newspaper should be commended for serving the purpose that the Founding Fathers saw so clearly.Collection: New York
The first ten amendments were proposed and adopted largely because of fear that Government might unduly interfere with prized individual liberties. The people wanted and demanded a Bill of Rights written into their Constitution. The amendments embodying the Bill of Rights were intended to curb all branches of the Federal Government in the fields touched by the amendments-Legislative, Executive, and Judicial.Collection: Rights
The Court stands against any winds that blow as havens of refuge for those who might otherwise suffer because they are helpless, weak, outnumbered, or because they are nonconforming victims of prejudice or public excitement.Collection: Blow
Freedom to speak and write about public questions is as important to the life of our government as is the heart to the human body. In fact, this privilege is the heart of our government. If that heart be weakened, the result is debilitation; if it be stilled, the result is death.Collection: Heart
The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach.Collection: Religious
No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance.Collection: Religious
In my judgment the people of no nation can lose their liberty so long as a Bill of Rights like ours survives and its basic purposes are conscientiously interpreted, enforced and respected so as to afford continuous protection against old, as well as new, devices and practices which might thwart those purposes. I fear to see the consequences of the Court's practice of substituting its own concepts of decency and fundamental justice for the language of the Bill of Rights as its point of departure in interpreting and enforcing that Bill of Rights.Collection: Rights
Criticism of government finds sanctuary in several portions of the 1st Amendment. It is part of the right of free speech. It embraces freedom of the pressCollection: Government
Freedom to publish means freedom for all and not for some. Freedom to publish is guaranteed by the constitution but freedom to continue to prevent others from publishing is not.Collection: Mean
The lesson which wars and depressions have taught is that if we want peace, prosperity and happiness at home we must help to establish them abroad.Collection: Peace
It would degrade our country and our judicial system to permit our courts to be bullied, insulted and humiliated and the orderly progress thwarted and obstructed by defendants brought before them charged with crimes.Collection: Country
The flagrant disregard in the courtroom of elementary standards of proper conduct should not and cannot be tolerated.Collection: Should
The interest of the people lies in being able to join organizations, advocate causes, and make political "mistakes" without being subjected to governmental penalties.Collection: Mistake
When the power, prestige and financial support of government is placed behind a particular religious belief, the indirect coercive pressure upon religious minorities to conform to the prevailing officially approved religion is plain.Collection: Religious
Compelling a man by law to pay his money to elect candidates or advocate law or doctrines he is against differs only in degree, if at all, from compelling him by law to speak for a candidate, a party, or a cause he is against. The very reason for the First Amendment is to make the people of this country free to think, speak, write and worship as they wish, not as the Government commands.Collection: Country