I cannot say that our country could have no secret police without becoming totalitarian, but I can say with great conviction that it cannot become totalitarian without a centralized national police.

The day that this country ceases to be free for irreligion it will cease to be free for religion - except for the sect that can win political power.

It is not the function of government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the government from falling into error.

Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard.

The common sense of mankind demands that law shall not stop with the punishment of petty crimes by little people. It must also reach men who possess themselves of great power.

I see no reason why I should be consciously wrong today because I was unconsciously wrong yesterday.

The price of freedom of religion or of speech or of the press is that we must put up with, and even pay for, a good deal of rubbish.

One's right to life, liberty, and property depends on the outcome of no election.

The most odious of all oppressions are those which mask as justice.

The priceless heritage of our society is the unrestricted constitutional right of each member to think as he will. Thought control is a copyright of totalitarianism, and we have no claim to it.

The very purpose of a bill of rights is to withdraw certain subjects from...political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities.

It is when those who are not strong enough have made some moderate amount of progress that they fail and give up...

A man who does not question his own judgment, society, and who flourishes between deceit and bewilderment, fails his moral responsibility as a rational being.

Water will be more important than oil this century

I'm very shy. That's probably one of the reasons I got so heavily into drugs.

Live fast, die young.

Be kinder than necessary.

I stepped on a land mine named Jayson Blair.

You know very well that whether you are on page one or page thirty depends on whether they fear you. It's as simple as that.

Now, we are selling over 5 million songs a day now. Isn't that unbelievable? That's 58 songs every second of every minute of every hour of every day.

The interests of a nation, when well understood, will be found to coincide with their moral duties.