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A theory deeply etched in our law [is that] a free society prefers to punish the few who abuse the rights of free speech after they break the law rather than to throttle them and all others beforehand.

Clarence Thomas

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Clarence Thomas
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: June 23
Associate Justice Of The Supreme Court Of The United States
Judge
Lawyer
Politician
Pin Point
Georgia
Others
Justice
Throttle
Break
Prefers
Rights
Beforehand
Law
Punish
Society
Abuse
Rather
Deeply
Free
Speech
Black
Theory
Etched

More quotes by Clarence Thomas

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I'm not an Uncle Tom. . .. I'm going to be here for 40 years. For those who don't like it, get over it.
Clarence Thomas
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Today, now, it is time to move forward, a time to look for what is good in others, what is good in our country. It is time to see what we have in common, what we have to share as human beings and citizens.
Clarence Thomas
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I don't know one of my friends who is considered a conservative who has not had to go back and thoroughly think through everything. You do a lot of soul-searching - 'cause we are not going to win any popularity contests.
Clarence Thomas
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I don't really have the luxury to be bitter. I don't have the luxury of having negative things in my life.
Clarence Thomas
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In my humble opinion, those who come to engage in debates of consequence, and who challenge accepted wisdom, should expect to be treated badly. Nonetheless, they must stand undaunted. That is required. And that should be expected. For it is bravery that is required to secure freedom.
Clarence Thomas
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The truth of the matter is we have become more interested in designer jeans and break dancing than we are in obligations and responsibilities.
Clarence Thomas
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I do think that our freedoms are at risk.
Clarence Thomas
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A good argument diluted to avoid criticism is not nearly as good as the undiluted argument, because we best arrive at truth through a process of honest and vigorous debate. Arguments should not sneak around in disguise, as if dissent were somehow sinister... For it is bravery that is required to secure freedom.
Clarence Thomas
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While the romanticized ideal of universal public education resonates with the cognoscenti who oppose vouchers, poor urban families just want the best education for their children, who will certainly need it to function in our high-tech and advanced society.
Clarence Thomas
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When you look at where the real problems are among minorities in our society, particularly blacks, it's at the bottom. It's the people who are in school systems that don't educate, neighborhoods where there is a lot of crime, drugs, the whole bit.
Clarence Thomas
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My grandfather could barely read. My grandmother had a sixth-grade education. They were people who were industrious. They were frugal.
Clarence Thomas
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And I thank God I believe in God, or I would probably be enormously angry right now.
Clarence Thomas
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I'd grown up fearing the lynch mobs of the Ku Klux Klan as an adult I was starting to wonder if I'd been afraid of the wrong white people all along - where I was being pursued not by bigots in white robes, but by left-wing zealots draped in flowing sanctimony.
Clarence Thomas
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In our society, marriage is not simply a governmental institution it is a religious institution as well, today's decision might change the former, but it cannot change the latter.
Clarence Thomas
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Even as someone who's labeled a conservative - I'm a Republican I'm black, I'm heading up this organization in the Reagan administration - I can say that conservatives don't exactly break their necks to tell blacks that they're welcome.
Clarence Thomas
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[T]he courts are so willing to assume that anything that is predominantly black must be inferior.... The mere fact that a school is black does not mean that it is the product of an unconstitutional violation.
Clarence Thomas
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Any discrimination, like sharp turns in a road, becomes critical because of the tremendous speed at which we are traveling into the high-tech world of a service economy.
Clarence Thomas
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If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything-and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.
Clarence Thomas
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I love being around people who work with their hands, who do the hard things to keep our country going. They're just my kind of people.
Clarence Thomas
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I actually think that I have been fortunate to have had misfortune, because the response, in responding to the misfortune, you develop in your own life, you develop sort of the tools you need to continue on, or to do better.
Clarence Thomas