At bottom, the battle has been waged on moral grounds. The country has debated whether a society for which the dignity of the individual is the supreme value can, without a fundamental inconsistency, follow the practice of deliberately putting one of its members to death.

Punishing desecration of the flag dilutes the very freedom that makes this emblem so revered.

There can be no doubt that our Nation has had a long and unfortunate history of sex discrimination. Traditionally, such discrimination was rationalized by an attitude of "romantic paternalism" which, in practical effect, put women, not on a pedestal, but in a cage.

There is no such thing as a false idea.

Congress acknowledged that society's accumulated myths and fears about disability and disease are as handicapping as are the physical limitations that flow from actual impairment.

Law cannot stand aside from the social changes around it.

No longer is the female destined solely for the home and the rearing of the family and only the male for the marketplace and the world of ideas.