Oliver Ellsworth Quotes

Liberty is the proper end and object of authority, and cannot subsist without it; and it is liberty to that which is good, just, and honest.

To be safe at the expense of the liberty of other people is a difficult equation.

It is terrible to speak of you, Liberty, for one who lives without you.

Freedom is never easily won, but once established, freedom lasts, spreads and chokes out tyranny.

Listen, when you take my liberty away, you've taken away more-something more precious than life. I mean, what good is a life without liberty? Huh? None.

There is nothing with which it is so dangerous to take liberties as liberty itself.

Freedom cannot be given... It can only be taken away.

Do we exert our own liberties without injury to others - we exert them justly; do we exert them at the expense of others - unjustly. And, in thus doing, we step from the sure platform of liberty upon the uncertain threshold of tyranny.

For what avail the plough or sail, / Or Land or life, if freedom fail?

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.

The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, bur incomparable things, called by the called by two different and incompatible names—liberty and tyranny.

Liberty is the most civilized and the least of evils in this world.

You know when people start talking about freedom they have to be old. They gotta be old-fashioned and really out of touch. Freedom? Well, what's that? Who needs any of that?

When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish.

The eternal conflict of good and the best with bad and the worst is on.

I am not interested in picking up crumbs of compassion thrown from the table of someone who considers himself my master. I want the full menu of rights.

The desire for liberty has also made itself felt as struggle against domestic tyranny or arbitrary rule.

Freedom of conscience entails more dangers than authority and despotism.

When we are unwilling to draw clear moral lines between free societies and fear societies, when we are unwilling to call the former good and the latter evil, we will not be able to advance the cause of peace because peace cannot be disconnected from freedom.

Perhaps the enemies of liberty are such only because they judge it by its loud voice.

If men were born free, they would, so long as they remained free, form no conception of good and evil.

Liberty may be endangered by the abuse of liberty, but also by the abuse of power.

The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.