Quotes on Liberty, Constitution, Bill of Rights, 2nd Amendment, Self-Reliance, This Day in History

I wanted to see if fellow Monkeys could share there favorite quotes on interrelated topics such as Liberty-Freedom, the Constitution - Bill of Rights, Unalienable Rights, the Second Amendment, Patriotism, Survivalism-Prepping, Economics, etc. The "status updates" Tweets on our Profile Page are limited to 140 characters which doesn't allow for much profundity.

So, here are a few of my favorites:

"But if someone has a gun and is trying to kill you... it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun." Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama, as quoted in "Dalai Lama urges students to shape world," in The Seattle Times (14 May 2001)


"An armed society is a polite society." - Robert Heinlein, Beyond This Horizon (1942)


"If gun laws in fact worked, the sponsors of this type of legislation should have no difficulty drawing upon long lists of examples of crime rates reduced by such legislation. That they cannot do so after a century and a half of trying — that they must sweep under the rug the southern attempts at gun control in the 1870-1910 period, the northeastern attempts in the 1920-1939 period, the attempts at both Federal and State levels in 1965-1976 — establishes the repeated, complete and inevitable failure of gun laws to control serious crime." - Orrin Hatch, "The Right to Keep and Bear Arms", Republican United States Senator from Utah, serving since 1977.


"A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks." -
Thomas Jefferson, WRITINGS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON 341 (Andrew A. Lipscomb ed., 1903). Letter to his nephew. (http://www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol/19adec.pdf)


"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them." - Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1833), p. 708. (Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States: With a Preliminary ... - Joseph Story - Google Books


"Tank: So what do you need? Besides a miracle.
Neo: Guns. Lots of guns."
- The Matrix (1999), (The Matrix (1999) - Quotes - IMDb


"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe." - Noah Webster, Examination into the the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution (1787) in Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States, Paul Leicester Ford (1888), p. 56. (Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States: Published During Its ... - Google Books


"We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." - Winston Churchill

 

Goverment's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives. Ronald Reagan.

 

"Send lawyers, guns, and money" --Warren Zevon

"You accomplish more with a smile, a handshake, and a gun than you do with just a smile and a handshake." --Al Capone

 

"Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back!" -- Captain Malcolm 'Mal' Reynolds

"Our government has no power except that granted it by the people. It is time to check and reverse the growth of government, which shows signs of having grown beyond the consent of the governed." - Ronald Reagan, January 20, 1981

 

"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms...disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes...Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."
--Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria, "On Crimes and Punishment"

 

Not a direct quote: We should not invade America for they are well armed and would be shooting at us from behind every blade of grass--Admiral Yamomoto(?) @ 1940

 

"In America, freedom and justice have always come from the ballot box, the jury box, and when that fails, the cartridge box."
Steve Symms, ex-U.S. Senator, Great Free State of Idaho (in the American Redoubt - The TSP Survival Wiki)

 

"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it." Thomas Paine

"A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity."
- Sigmund freud

 

"For when we come home, either standing or dead,
to know you remember we fought and we bled
is payment enough, and with that we will trust.
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us." Standing Guard : by Michael Marks

Thanks to @ghrit signature.

"Posterity! you will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom! I hope you will make a good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in Heaven that I ever took half the pains to preserve it." - John Adams, letter to Abigail

"Liberty is not a cruise ship full of pampered passengers. It is a man of war and we are all crew." - Boston T. Party (a.k.a. Kenneth Royce of Free State Wyoming - On the Frontiers of Freedom

 

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin

"One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them." - Thomas Jefferson

“Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” - James Madison

Thanks to the Survival Monkey Tree for helping so much with arming us with the power that knowledge gives!

 

I love clear-sighted or inspiring quotes:

“Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.” -- Robert A. Heinlein

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“It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds” -- Samuel Adams

 

“Now those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth, and let me remind you they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyranny.” – Barry Goldwater

 

“[A] wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” – Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801

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“Is the American tradition of self-reliance disappearing? That’s a painful question for conservatives to ponder. After all, we’re dedicated to reducing the role of government and promoting individual freedom and opportunity. But the facts, while sad, are clear: More Americans today depend more heavily on government than ever before.” –Edwin Feulner

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“It happened that a fire broke out backstage in a theater. The clown came out to inform the public. They thought it was just a jest and applauded. He repeated his warning, they shouted even louder. So I think the world will come to an end amid general applause from all the wits, who believe that it is a joke.” – Soren Kierkegaard

 

"If we do not lay ourselves in the service of mankind, whom should we serve?" - John Adams

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“It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn't even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened. But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something.”

“What are we holding on to, Sam?”

“That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it’s worth fighting for.”

- J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

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“My life goes on in endless song
above earth’s lamentations,
I hear the real, though far-off hymn
that hails a New Creation. Through all the tumult and the strife
I hear its music ringing,
it sounds an echo in my soul.
How can I keep from singing?
While though the tempest loudly roars,
I hear the truth it liveth.
And though the darkness ’round me close,
songs in the night it giveth. No storm can shake my inmost calm
While to that rock I’m clinging.
Since love is lord of heaven and earth,
how can I keep from singing? When tyrants tremble in their fear
and hear their death knell ringing,
when friends rejoice both far and near
how can I keep from singing? In prison cell and dungeon vile
our thoughts to them are winging,
when friends by shame are undefiled
how can I keep from singing?”

-The Traditional Shaker Hymn How Can I Keep From Singing, popularized by Enya

 

“For it’s ‘guns this’ and ‘guns that’, and ‘chuck ‘em out, the brutes’,
But they’re the ‘Savior of our loved ones’ when the thugs begin to loot.”
- Rudyard Kipling , Tommy Atkins

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“You have never lived
’til you have almost died.
And for those that fight for it,
Life has a flavor that the protected will never know.”
-- Anonymous quote penned on the wall of a USMC hooch at Khe Sahn, RVN

 

“Many more people could ride out the storm-tossed waves in their economic lives if they had their year’s supply of food and clothing and were debt-free. Today we find that many have followed this counsel in reverse: they have at least a year’s supply of debt and are food-free” -- Thomas S. Monson, “That Noble Gift–Love at Home,” [LDS] Church News, 12 May 2001, 7).

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“…nuclear warfare is not necessary to cause a breakdown of our society. You take a large city like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago – their water supply comes from hundreds of miles away. Any interruption of that, or food, or power for any period of time and you’re going to have riots in the streets. Our society is so fragile, so dependent on the interworking of things to provide us with goods and services, that you don’t need nuclear warfare to fragment us any more than the Romans did for their eventual downfall.” -- Gene Roddenberry, Creator of Star Trek

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"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. " -- J. Krishnamurti

 

Someone is spending waayyy too much time on google <rolls eyes>.