Category: Thought

I had crossed de line of which I had so long been dreaming. I was free; but dere was no one to welcome me to de land of freedom, I was a stranger in a strange land, and my home after all was down in de old cabin quarter, wid de ole folks, and my brudders and sisters. But to dis solemn resolution I came; I was free, and dey should be free also; I would make a home for dem in de North, and de Lord helping me, I would bring dem all dere.

Harriet Tubman, as quoted in Sarah H. Bradford, The Moses of Her People (1886).

I was the conductor of the Underground Railroad for eight years, and I can say what most conductors can’t say — I never ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger.

Harriet Tubman, as quoted in Mary Biggs, Women’s Words: The Columbia Book of Quotations by Women (1996), p. 2.

Morality, and the ideal of freedom which is the political expression of morality, are not the property of a given party or group, but a value that is fundamentally and universally human. . . . No people will be truly free till all are free.

Benedetto Croce was an Italian philosopher and outspoken anti-fascist.

The next time you download a book on Kindle, buy a Michael Moore screed at Barnes & Noble, or order up a political movie from video on demand, remember that it is the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United that guarantees you the right to do so.

Bradley A. Smith, “Newsflash: First Amendment Upheld,” Wall Street Journal.

He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Isaac McPherson (1813).

The intelligent man, when he pays taxes, certainly does not believe that he is making a prudent and productive investment of his money; on the contrary, he feels that he is being mulcted in an excessive amount for services that, in the main, are useless to him, and that, in substantial part, are downright inimical to him.

H. L. Mencken, in A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949).

Under Socialism the efficient man would have a price upon his head.

H. L. Mencken, in Robert Rives La Monte and Mencken, Men versus The Man (1910).

Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others?

Thomas Jefferson, First Innaugural Address, March 4, 1801.

This is the nature of human energy; individuals generate it, and control it. Each person is self-controlling, and therefore responsible for his acts. Every human being, by his nature, is free.

Rose Wilder Lane, Discovery of Freedom (1943).

[T]he average workingman has before him two practicable methods for satisfying his will to power. By the first method he enters into a conspiracy with other workingmen . . . endeavor[ing] to raise the market value of their skill without offering any corresponding improvement in its quality. By the second method, the individual workman seeks so to improve his own skill that it shall bring more than the average price.

H. L. Mencken, in Robert Rives La Monte and Mencken, Men versus The Man (1910).