Top William O. Douglas Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

William O. Douglas Biography

William O. Douglas

William Orville Douglas (October 16, 1898 – January 19, 1980) was an American jurist and politician who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Nominated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Douglas was confirmed at the age of 40, one of the youngest justices appointed to the court. His term, lasting 36 years and 211 days (1939–75), is the longest in the history of the Supreme Court. In 1975 Time magazine called Douglas "the most doctrinaire and committed civil libertarian ever to sit on the court".

Read about William O. Douglas in Wikipedia

Random Authors

William O. Douglas Quotes

The law is not a series of calculating machines where answers come tumbling out when the right levers are pushed.

Law, Machines, Right, Series, Tumbling

No matter what the legislature may say, a man has the right to make his speech, print his handbill, compose his newspaper, and deliver his sermon without asking anyone's permission. The contrary suggestion is abhorrent to our traditions.

Abhorrent, Handbill, Legislature, Men, Newspaper, Suggestions

The Free Exercise Clause protects the individual from any coercive measure that encourages him toward one faith or creed, discourages him from another, or makes it prudent or desirable for him to select one and embrace it.

Atheism, Exercise, Free, Individual, Prudent

Absolute discretion is a ruthless master. It is more destructive of freedom than any of man's other inventions.

Absolute, Destructive, Invention, Masters, Men, Ruthless

There have always been grievances and youth has always been the agitator.

Agitation, Agitator, Grievance, Grievances, Youth

The right to dissent is the only thing that makes life tolerable for a judge of an appellate court. . . the affairs of government could not be conducted by democratic standards without it.

Conducted, Dissent, Government, Judging, Liberty, Thing

Our upside down welfare state is socialism for the rich, free enterprise for the poor.

Free, Rich, Socialism, State, Upside, Upside Down

To be whole and harmonious, man must also know the music of the beaches and the woods. He must find the thing of which he is only an infinitesimal part and nurture it and love it, if he is to live.

Beach, Man, Men, Nature, Thing, Woods

A reporter is no better than his source of information.

Information, Reporter, Reporters, Source

The people, the ultimate governors, must have absolute freedom of, and therefore privacy of, their individual opinions and beliefs regardless of how suspect or strange they may appear to others. Ancillary to that principle is the conclusion that an individual must also have absolute privacy over whatever information he may generate in the course of testing his opinions and beliefs.

Freedom Of Speech, May, People, Principle, Regardless

I hope to be remembered as someone who made the earth a little more beautiful.

Beautiful, Earth, Hope, Littles

Racial discrimination against a white is as unconstitutional as race discrimination against a black.

Black, Discrimination, Race, Racial, White

The First Amendment makes confidence in the common sense of our people and in the maturity of their judgement the great postulate of our democracy.

Amendment, Common Sense, Confidence, Maturity, People

We must realize that today's establishment is the new George III. Whether it will continue to adhere to his tactics, we do not know. If it does, the redress, honored in tradition, is also revolution.

Adhere, Doe, Honored, Iii, Tactics, Today

The conscience of this nation is the Constitution.

Conscience, Constitution, Nation, Nations

The most important aspect of freedom of speech is freedom to learn. All education is a continuous dialogue - questions and answers that pursue every problem on the horizon. That is the essence of academic freedom.

Academic Freedom, Answers, Essence, Graduation, Problem, Pursue

Literature should not be suppressed merely because it offends the moral code of the censor.

Censorship, Code, Literature, Moral, Suppressed

I do not know of any salvation for society except through eccentrics, misfits, dissenters, people who protest.

Misfits, People, Protest, Salvation

The right to work, I had assumed, was the most precious liberty that man possesses. Man has indeed as much right to work as he has to live, to be free, to own property.

Free, Liberty, Men, Right, Wisdom, Work

Freedom of movement is the very essence of our free society -- once the right to travel is curtailed, all other rights suffer.

Essence, Free, Government, Rights, Travel

1