Men in authority will always think that criticism of their policies is dangerous. They will always equate their policies with patriotism, and find criticism subversive.

The decision for complete religious freedom and for separation of church and state in the eyes of the rest of the world was perhaps the most important decision reached in the New World. Everywhere in the western world of the 18th century, church and state were one; and everywhere the state maintained an established church and tried to force conformity to its dogma.

Education is essential to change, for education creates both new wants and the ability to satisfy them.

The Americans who framed our Constitution felt that without freedom of religion no other freedom counted.

America was born of revolt, flourished in dissent, became great through experimentation.

The greatest danger we face is not any particular kind of thought. The greatest danger we face is absence of thought.

We cannot have a society half slave and half free; nor can we have thought half slave and half free. If we create an atmosphere in which men fear to think independently, inquire fearlessly, express themselves freely, we will in the end create the kind of society in which men no longer care to think independently or to inquire fearlessly.