We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.
The most important political office is that of the private citizen.
Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.
America has believed that in differentiation, not in uniformity, lies the path of progress. It acted on this belief; it has advanced human happiness, and it has prospered.
Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done.
If you would only recognize that life is hard, things would be so much easier for you.
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.
Fear of serious injury alone cannot justify oppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burnt women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fears.
I abhor averages. I like the individual case. A man may have six meals one day and none the next, making an average of three meals per day, but that is not a good way to live.
Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.
Those who won our independence... valued liberty as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.
There are no shortcuts in evolution.
Neutrality is at times a graver sin than belligerence.
Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.
What are the American ideals? They are the development of the individual for his own and the common good; the development of the individual through liberty; and the attainment of the common good through democracy and social justice.
Democracy rests upon two pillars: one, the principle that all men are equally entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; and the other, the conviction that such equal opportunity will most advance civilization.
The world presents enough problems if you believe it to be a world of law and order; do not add to them by believing it to be a world of miracles.
If we would guide by the light of reason we must let our minds be bold.
To declare that in the administration of criminal law the end justifies the means to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure conviction of a private criminal would bring terrible retribution.
The logic of words should yield to the logic of realities.
