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We will not make inroads into the gun-violence problem until we acknowledge the underlying causes of youth behavior today, compared to yesterday. ... we must come to the realization that laws and regulations alone cannot produce a civilized society. It's morality that is society's first line of defense against uncivilized behavior.

Walter E. Williams

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Walter E. Williams
Age: 84 †
Born: 1936
Born: March 31
Died: 2020
Died: December 1
Columnist
Economist
Journalist
Radio Personality
University Teacher
Philadelphia
Pennsylvania
Walter Williams
Walter Edward Williams
Must
Law
Behavior
Civilized
Make
Society
Line
Realization
Cannot
Youth
Acknowledge
Inroads
Problem
Produce
Gun
Uncivilized
Today
Violence
Yesterday
Regulations
Firsts
Lines
Defense
Underlying
Come
Causes
Morality
Regulation
First
Alone
Laws
Compared

More quotes by Walter E. Williams

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Experts and the educated elite have replaced what worked with what sounded good. Society was far more civilized before they took over our schools, prisons, welfare programs, police departments and courts. It's high time we ran these people out of our lives and went back to common sense.
Walter E. Williams
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(F)or 50 years, the well-meaning leftist agenda has been able to do to blacks what Jim Crow and harsh discrimination could never have done: family breakdown, illegitimacy and low academic achievement.
Walter E. Williams
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I don't know about you, but if you hear that Williams guns have been taken, you'll know Williams is dead.
Walter E. Williams
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Democracy and liberty are not the same. Democracy is little more than mob rule, while liberty refers to the sovereignty of the individual.
Walter E. Williams
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We should view our government the way we should a friendly, cuddly lion. Just because he's friendly and cuddly shouldn't blind us to the fact that he's still got teeth and claws.
Walter E. Williams
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Politicians have always coveted the liberties we hold.
Walter E. Williams
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Having children is not an act of God. It's not like you're walking down the street and pregnancy strikes you children are a result of a conscious decision. For the most part, female-headed households are the result of short-sighted, self-destructive behavior of one or two people.
Walter E. Williams
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The greatest percentage of poverty is found in female-headed households. Over 70 percent of female-headed households are poor. A large percentage of poor people are children (17 percent) fully 85 percent of black children living in poverty reside in a female-headed household.
Walter E. Williams
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However, if we wish to be compassionate with our fellow man, we must learn to engage in dispassionate analysis. In other words, thinking with our hearts, rather than our brains, is a surefire method to hurt those whom we wish to help.
Walter E. Williams
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Most of what Congress does fits the description of forcing one American to serve the purposes of another American. That description differs only in degree, but not in kind, from slavery.
Walter E. Williams
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If you hate my guts and have designs to hurt me, and I see you building a cannon aimed at my house, I am not going to wait for you to finish construction.
Walter E. Williams
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If we buy into the notion that somehow property rights are less important, or are in conflict with, human or civil rights, we give the socialists a freer hand to attack our property.
Walter E. Williams
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I learned that you have to evaluate the effects of public policy as opposed to intentions.
Walter E. Williams
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Reduced employment opportunities is one effect of minimum wage legislation. The minimum wage law has imposed incalculable harm on the disadvantaged members of our society. The only moral thing to do is to repeal it.
Walter E. Williams
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But let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn belongs to you - and why?
Walter E. Williams
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Charity is reaching into one's own pockets to assist his fellow man in need. Reaching into someone else's pocket to assist one's fellow man hardly qualifies as charity. When done privately, we deem it theft, and the individual risks jail time.
Walter E. Williams
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According to the Institute for International Economics, trade barriers cost American consumers $80 billion a year or more than $1,200 per family.
Walter E. Williams
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The global warming scare has provided a field day for politicians and others who wish to control our lives. After all, only the imagination limits the kind of laws and restrictions that can be written in the name of saving the planet.
Walter E. Williams
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The prospects are dim for a society that makes mascots out of the unproductive and condemns the productive.
Walter E. Williams
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The public good is promoted best by people pursuing their own private interests. This bothers some people because they're more concerned with motives than with results.
Walter E. Williams