The right most valued by all civilized men is the right to be left alone.
If you will just start with the idea that this is a hard world, it will all be much simpler.
Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.
No system of regulation can safely be substituted for the operation of individual liberty as expressed in competition.
Nearly all legislation involves a weighing of public needs as against private desires; and likewise a weighing of relative social values.
Subtler and more far-reaching means of invading privacy have become available to the government. Discovery and invention have made it possible for the government, by means far more effective than stretching upon the rack, to obtain disclosure in court of what is whispered in the closet.
Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and assembly.
The function of the press is very high. It is almost holy. It ought to serve as a forum for the people, through which the people may know freely what is going on. To misstate or suppress the news is a breach of trust.
There are better mothers than disaster. A native land is the best of all mothers. We American Jews have a native land we love. But it is even better to have a native land who loves us.
The goose that lays golden eggs has been considered a most valuable possession. But even more profitable is the privilege of taking the golden eggs laid by somebody else’s goose. The investment bankers and their associates now enjoy that privilege.
To be good Americans, we must be better Jews, and to be better Jews, we must become Zionists.
Ownership has been separated from control; and this separation has removed many of the checks which formerly operated to curb the misuse of wealth and power.
Repression breeds hate; hate menaces stable government.
History is not life, but since only life makes history, the union of the two is obvious.
There is a spark of idealism within every individual which can be fanned into flame and bring forth extraordinary results.
There is no such thing as an innocent purchaser of stocks.
The general rule of law is, that the noblest of human productions knowledge, truths ascertained, conceptions and ideas become, after voluntary communication to others, free as the air to common use.
We shall have lost something vital and beyond price on the day when the state denies us the right to resort to force...
Anyone who critically analyzes a business learns this: that the success or failure of an enterprise depends usually upon one man.
No danger flowing from speech can be deemed clear and present unless the incidence of the evil apprehended is so imminent that it may befall before there is an opportunity for full discussion. Only an emergency can justify repression.
I think all of our human Experience shows that no one with absolute power can be trusted to give it up even in part.