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The best use of good laws is to teach men to trample bad laws under their feet.

Wendell Phillips

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Wendell Phillips
Age: 72 †
Born: 1811
Born: November 29
Died: 1884
Died: February 2
Jurist
Lawyer
Politician
Boston
Massachusetts
Best
Good
Men
Trample
Laws
Feet
Teach
Law
Use

More quotes by Wendell Phillips

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Immoral laws are doubtless void, and should not be obeyed.
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If there is anything in the universe that can't stand discussion, let it crack.
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Health lies in labor, and there is no royal road to it but through toil.
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What is defeat? Nothing but education, nothing but the first step to something better.
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The community which does not protect its humblest and most hated member in the free utterance of his opinions, no matter how false or hateful, is only a gang of slaves. If there is anything in the universe that can't stand discussion, let it crack.
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What is fanaticism today is the fashionable creed tomorrow, and trite as the multiplication table a week after.
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Hearts are stronger than swords.
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Republics exist only on the tenure of being constantly agitated.... There is no republican road to safety but in constant distrust.
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Government arrogates to itself that it alone forms men. Everybody knows that government never began anything. It is the whole world that thinks and governs.
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How prudently most men creep into nameless graves, while now and then one or two forget themselves into immortality.
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Agitation is the atmosphere of the brains.
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The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance.
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The reformer is careless of numbers, disregards popularity, and deals only with ideas, conscience, and common sense. He feels, with Copernicus, that as God waited long for an interpreter, so he can wait for his followers.
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We live under a government of men and morning newspapers.
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The man who, for party, forsakes righteousness, goes down and the armed battalions of God march over him.
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Agitation prevents rebellion, keeps the peace, and secures progress. Every step she gains is gained forever. Muskets are the weapons of animals. Agitation is the atmosphere of the brains.
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Today it is not big business that we have to fear. It is big government.
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Great political questions stir the deepest nature of one-half the nation, but they pass far above and over the heads of the other half.
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The Puritan's idea of hell is a place where everybody has to mind his own business.
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Government began in tyranny and force, began in the feudalism of the soldier and bigotry of the priest and the ideas of justice and humanity have been fighting their way, like a thunderstorm, against the organized selfishness of human nature.
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