Quote

As night-fall does not come at once, neither does oppression...It is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air - however slight - lest we become victims of the darkness.

William O. Douglas

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

William O. Douglas
Age: 81 †
Born: 1898
Born: October 16
Died: 1980
Died: January 19
Former Associate Justice Of The Supreme Court Of The United States
Judge
Lawyer
Trade Unionist
University Teacher
William Orville Douglas
William Douglas
Doe
Neither
Come
Air
Lest
Must
However
Slight
Darkness
Twilight
Fall
Victims
Night
Oppression
Become
Victim
Change
Aware

More quotes by William O. Douglas

Image
At the constitutional level where we work, 90 percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for supporting our predilections.
William O. Douglas
Image
It is our attitude toward free thought and free expression that will determine our fate. There must be no limit on the range of temperate discussion, no limits on thought. No subject must be taboo. No censor must preside at our assemblies.
William O. Douglas
Image
Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
William O. Douglas
Image
The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedom.
William O. Douglas
Image
The Framers [of the Constitution] . . . created the federally protected right of silence and decreed that the law could not be used to pry open one's lips and make him a witness against himself.
William O. Douglas
Image
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.
William O. Douglas
Image
Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation in office as essential to the preservation of the nation.
William O. Douglas
Image
Common sense often makes a good law.
William O. Douglas
Image
World federation is an ideal that will not die. More and more people are coming to realize that peace must be more than an interlude if we are to survive that peace is a produce of law and order that law is essential if the force of arms is not to rule the world.
William O. Douglas
Image
The Constitution favors no racial group - no political or social group.
William O. Douglas
Image
The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence beyond the reach of government.
William O. Douglas
Image
Power that controls the economy should be in the hands of elected representatives of the people, not in the hands of an industrial oligarchy.
William O. Douglas
Image
The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.
William O. Douglas
Image
We who have the final word can speak softly or angrily. We can seek to challenge and annoy, as we need not stay docile and quiet.
William O. Douglas
Image
I hope to be remembered as someone who made the earth a little more beautiful.
William O. Douglas
Image
I've often thought that if planners were botanists, zoologists, geologists, and people who know about the earth, we would have much more wisdom in such planning than we have when we leave it to the engineers.
William O. Douglas
Image
The right to revolt has sources deep in our history.
William O. Douglas
Image
The struggle is always between the individual and his sacred right to express himself and the power structure that seeks conformity, suppression, and obedience.
William O. Douglas
Image
I do not know of any salvation for society except through eccentrics, misfits, dissenters, people who protest.
William O. Douglas
Image
Big Brother in the form of an increasingly powerful government and in an increasingly powerful private sector will pile the records high with reasons why privacy should give way to national security, to law and order, to efficiency of operation, to scientific advancement and the like.
William O. Douglas