John Ashcroft Quotes

This has been a learning experience for me. I also thought that privacy was something we were granted in the Constitution. I have learned from this when in fact the word privacy does not appear in the Constitution.

Privacy is not explicitly spelled out in the Constitution as freedom of speech is in the First Amendment.

We need to start seeing privacy as a commons - as some kind of a public good that can get depleted as too many people treat it carelessly or abandon it too eagerly. What is privacy for? This question needs an urgent answer.

A right of privacy doesn't emerge from any single part of the Constitution. The right of privacy emerges from the Constitution as a whole.

In this era of massive online connectivity, the majority of privacy breaches and data leaks remain unknown, unchallenged, and unregulated. Regulatory compliance alone cannot ensure privacy.

Privacy may actually be an anomaly.

With those people, I'm very far apart, because I believe that government access to communications and stored records is valuable when done under tightly controlled conditions which protect legitimate privacy interests.

First, the security and privacy of sensitive taxpayer information is absolutely essential.

Secret government programs that pry into people's private affairs are bound up with ideas about secrecy and privacy that arose during the process by which the mysterious became secular.

I really fight for my privacy.

I have nothing to hide!

I want my government to do something about my privacy - I don't want to just do it on my own.

The U.S. Constitution protects our privacy from the prying eyes of government. It does not, however, protect us from the prying eyes of companies and corporations.

There is a difference between giving up privacy under the rule of law, and giving it up by executive fiat.

We don’t have to choose between preserving privacy and preventing terrorism. We do have to decide how much oversight and accountability there should be when the government conducts surveillance on its citizens.

… corporations do almost everything that the federal government has been banned from doing under various laws, in particular the Privacy Act of 1974.

I think it makes no difference whether or not I endorse it. The Constitution is as the Supreme Court interprets it and I must conform to this and do my best to see that it is carried out in this country.

Certainly I support the Constitution, and I respect people's privacy, but I also think we need to err on the side of protecting us.

Do you believe today that the right to privacy does exist in the Constitution?

Right to privacy is really important. You pull that brick out and another and pretty soon the house falls.

Ironically, one of the clearer threats to consumer privacy is the government's largely unchecked ability to collect your sensitive information without due process.

I do suspect that privacy was a passing fad.

You have to fight for your privacy or you lose it.

Historically, privacy was almost implicit, because it was hard to find and gather information. But in the digital world, whether it's digital cameras or satellites or just what you click on, we need to have more explicit rules - not just for governments but for private companies.

I particularly recognize that reasonable people can disagree as to what that proper balance or blend is between privacy and security and safety.