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I cannot agree with those who think of the Bill of Rights as an 18th century straitjacket, unsuited for this age...The evils it guards against are not only old, they are with us now, they exist today.

Hugo Black

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Hugo Black
Age: 85 †
Born: 1886
Born: February 27
Died: 1971
Died: September 25
Former Associate Justice Of The Supreme Court Of The United States
Judge
Lawyer
Military Personnel
Politician
Ashland
Alabama
Hugo Lafayette Black
Evil
Bill
Cannot
Gun
Today
Bills
Think
Agree
Thinking
Exist
Unsuited
Century
Straitjacket
Rights
Guards
Age
Evils

More quotes by Hugo Black

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Citizenship is no light trifle to be jeopardized any moment Congress decides to do so under the name of one of its general or implied grants of power.
Hugo Black
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Words uttered under coercion are proof of loyalty to nothing but self-interest. Love of country must spring from willing hearts and free minds.
Hugo Black
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The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people.
Hugo Black
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Sex is a fact of life...and while it may lead to abuses...no words need be spoken...for people to know that the subject is one pleasantly interwoven in all human activities and involves the very substance of creation itself.
Hugo Black
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I am for the First Amendment from the first word to the last. I believe it means what it says.
Hugo Black
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Criticism of government finds sanctuary in several portions of the 1st Amendment. It is part of the right of free speech. It embraces freedom of the press
Hugo Black
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The very first condition of lasting happiness is that a life should be full of purpose, aiming at something outside self.
Hugo Black
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Freedom of speech means that you shall not do something to people either for the views they have, or the views they express, or the words they speak or write.
Hugo Black
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No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance.
Hugo Black
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The Framers of the Constitution knew that free speech is the friend of change and revolution. But they also knew that it is always the deadliest enemy of tyranny.
Hugo Black
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The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.
Hugo Black
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In revealing the workings of government that led to the Vietnam War, the newspapers nobly did precisely that which the Founders hoped and trusted they would do.
Hugo Black
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Our Constitution was not written in the sands to be washed away by each wave of new judges blown in by each successive political wind.
Hugo Black
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No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion.
Hugo Black
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[I]t is true that [the provisions of the Bill of Rights] were designed to meet ancient evils. But they are the same kind of human evils that have emerged from century to century whenever excessive power is sought by the few at the expense of the many.
Hugo Black
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It would degrade our country and our judicial system to permit our courts to be bullied, insulted and humiliated and the orderly progress thwarted and obstructed by defendants brought before them charged with crimes.
Hugo Black
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The layman's constitutional view is that what he likes is constitutional and that which he doesn't like is unconstitutional.
Hugo Black
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That Amendment requires the state to be a neutral in its relations with groups of religious believers and nonbelievers it does not require the state to be their adversary. State power is no more to be used so as to handicap religions than it is to favor them.
Hugo Black
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Laws are made to protect the trusting as well as the suspicious
Hugo Black
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No higher duty, or more solemn responsibility, rests upon this Court than that of translating into living law and maintaining this constitutional shield deliberately planned and inscribed for the benefit of every human being subject to our Constitution - of whatever race, creed or persuasion.
Hugo Black