Joseph Smith Jr. Quotes

Everywhere that freedom stirs, let tyrants fear.

You know, the truth is this: it is a leader's job to challenge the status quo. And when you do, you make enemies.

Unless one is inordinately fond of subordination, one is always at war.

What has commonly been called rebellion has more often been nothing but a glorious struggle in opposition to the lawless power of rebellious kings and princes

Truth is always the enemy of power. And power the enemy of truth.

Law and arbitrary power are in eternal enmity.

The magistrate has the right to enforce what he thinks, and he who is conscious of the truth has a right to suffer.

Between the people and their enemies there can be nothing in common but the sword; we must govern by iron those who cannot be governed by justice; we must oppress the tyrant...

I started to fight with the men. I raised my voice, and they started listening to me.

Power Concedes Nothing

Power in defense of freedom is greater than power in behalf of tyranny and oppression

If you will not have it thus: if in the pride of power, if in contempt of reason and reliance upon force, you say we shall not go, but shall remain as subjects to you, then, gentlemen of the North, a war is to be inaugurated the like of which men have not seen.

The church hates a thinker precisely for the same reason a robber dislikes a sheriff, or a thief despises the prosecuting witness.

My voice is still for war. Gods! can a Roman senate long debate Which of the two to choose, slavery or death?

Is it just or reasonable, that most voices against the main end of government should enslave the less number that would be free? more just it is, doubtless, if it come to force, that a less number compel a greater to retain, which can be no wrong to them, their liberty, than that a greater number, for the pleasure of their baseness, compel a less most injuriously to be their fellow-slaves. They who seek nothing but their own just liberty, have always right to win it and to keep it, whenever they have power, be the voices never so numerous that oppose it.

I worked with a group of people who argued day and night - professors, officials, the Minister of Finance - but there were decisions that I had to make.

People demand freedom only when they have no power.

Without peace, there is no freedom, individual or national. War and hostilities are a form of slavery.

Law represents the effort of man to organize society; governments, the efforts of selfishness to overthrow liberty.

Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

He that rebels against reason is a real rebel, but he that in defence of reason rebels against tyranny has a better title to Defender of the Faith, than George the Third.

Those who 'abjure' violence can do so only because others are committing violence on their behalf.

The function of the law is not to provide justice or to preserve freedom. The function of the law is to keep those who hold power, in power.

I say to you that the price of liberty is and always has been blood, human blood, and if our liberties are lost, we shall never regain them except at the price of blood. They must not be lost.

God himself has no right to be a tyrant.