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The left looks at the Constitution and sees things that aren't there and then they find 'em. They look at things that are there and claim they're not there. Like the Second Amendment, nah, nah, it's not there, they really didn't intend that. No, no. Abortion. You can't find it, yeah, there it is, plain as day, see, it's right there in the 14th Amendment, the Tenth Amendment, the Ninth Amendment, the Fifth - no, it's not.
Rush Limbaugh...The Bill of Rights is a literal and absolute document. The First Amendment doesn't say you have a right to speak out unless the government has a 'compelling interest' in censoring the Internet. The Second Amendment doesn't say you have the right to keep and bear arms until some madman plants a bomb. The Fourth Amendment doesn't say you have the right to be secure from search and seizure unless some FBI agent thinks you fit the profile of a terrorist. The government has no right to interfere with any of these freedoms under any circumstances.
Harry BrowneBy calling attention to 'a well regulated militia,' 'the security of the nation,' and the right of each citizen 'to keep and bear arms,' our founding fathers recognized the essentially civilian nature of our economy... The Second Amendment still remains an important declaration of our basic civilian-military relationships in which every citizen must be ready to participate in the defense of his country. For that reason I believe the Second Amendment will always be important.
John F. KennedyAlmost 100 years after women secured the right to vote in 1920 through the 19th Amendment, we still do not have equal rights under the Constitution. My question for the GOP candidates: Do you support the Equal Rights Amendment?
Jane FondaWhatever right the Second Amendment protects is not as important as it was 200 years ago... The government should deconstitutionalize the subject by repealing the embarrasing Amendment.
George WillDesperate times require desperate measures. What Lincoln and the Lobbyist for the Amendment and the Manager of the Amendment and himself, what they did to get this passed was not illegal. It was murky, but what they did was noble and grand. How they went about it was somewhat murky. Nothing they did was really illegal.
Steven SpielbergA school prayer amendment would confer upon public school boards a power the First Amendment now denies to Congress and the states, that is, the power to establish religion.
Sam ErvinI'm a big supporter of the Second Amendment. But I think I have a First Amendment right not to be shot.
Michael NutterThe Fourteenth Amendment, after the civil war, in principle brought former slaves into the category of persons, theoretically. But if you actually look, almost all the cases brought up for personal rights under the Fourteenth Amendment were by corporations. Freed slaves couldn't do it. In fact they were pretty much driven back into something like slavery by a north - south compact, that allowed former slave states to criminalize black life, which made a criminal force that was basically used as a forced labor force, up until the 1930s.
Noam ChomskySo now we're after a constitutional amendment that defines marriage as a guy-and-gal thing. To the founders, this would have been like an amendment requiring the sun to rise in the east; it would fall under the category of obvious truths that the Constitution need not address.
James LileksI do not believe that it can be too often repeated that the freedoms of speech, press, petition and assembly guaranteed by the First Amendment must be accorded to the ideas we hate or sooner or later they will be denied to the ideas we cherish. The first banning of an association because it advocates hated ideas - whether that association be called a political party or not - marks a fateful moment in the history of a free country.
Hugo BlackI don't think it's a lack of will. I think it's an issue of what people view as constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment, number one, and what customers and business partners expect around the world from secure computing systems. And it's a difference of view.
Rod BeckstromFor the church to say that abortion is not acceptable for a Catholic is fine. To say directly or indirectly that on something that is a church teaching that you must also vote according to that - that's not acceptable in a country based on the First Amendment.
Patrick LeahyI felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in 'We, the people.'
Barbara JordanThe purpose that brought the fourteenth amendment into being was equality before the law, and equality, not separation, was written into the law.
Robert BorkThe 22nd Amendment should probably be modified to say two consecutive terms instead of two terms for a lifetime.
William J. ClintonIf, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.
George WashingtonSenator majority leader, Mitch McConnell, slammed [Donald] Trump`s comments about burning the American flag which is protected under the first amendment should lead to jail time.
Chuck ToddThose stories weren't being written at all - stories about women's inner lives and outer activism. We've come miles and miles, but we still don't have an equal rights amendment yet. We don't have equal pay yet. There's a lot of blind misogyny that's not personal, but institutionalized. We still have work to do, but even just looking at those old Ms. Magazines is a cool thing to do - to see how daring they were. They just went right into the belly of the beast.
Marisa TomeiThe First Amendment gives all of us - it gives it to me, it gives it to you, it gives all Americans - the right to speak our minds freely. It gives you the right and me the right to criticize fake news, and criticize it strongly.
Donald TrumpI say that the Second Amendment doesn't allow for exceptions - or else it would have read that the right "to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, unless Congress chooses otherwise." And because there are no exceptions, I disagree with my fellow panelists who say the existing gun laws should be enforced. Those laws are unconstitutional [and] wrong - because they put you at a disadvantage to armed criminals, to whom the laws are no inconvenience.
Harry BrowneViolating the 4th Amendment guarantees against illegal searches and seizures is not the way to solve crime problems.
Tim WiseThere are many prices we pay for freedoms secured by the First Amendment; the risk of undue influence is one of them, confirming what we have long known: Freedom is hazardous, but some restraints are worse.
Warren E. BurgerThe Fourth Amendment is clear; we should be secure in our persons, houses, papers, and effects, and all warrants must have probable cause. Today the government operates largely in secret, while seeking to know everything about our private lives - without probable cause and without a warrant.
Ron PaulIf newsmen do not tell the truth as they see it because it might make waves, or if their bosses decide something should or should not be broadcast because of Washington or Main Street consequences, we have dishonored ourselves and we have lost the First Amendment by default.
Richard S. SalantThe Washington Times wrote a story questioning the authenticity of some of the suggestions made about me in Silent Coup. But as a believer in the First Amendment, I believe they have more than a right to air their views.
Bob WoodwardThe prima facie evidence provision in this case ignores all of the contextual factors that are necessary to decide whether a particular cross burning is intended to intimidate. The First Amendment does not permit such a shortcut.
Sandra Day O'ConnorThe First Amendment to the Constitution says government can't establish a religion, but neither can it limit the exercise of religion. And that's the issue here. What does it mean to be free to exercise your religion? It's not about what you can believe. It's whether you can act on those beliefs.
Tom GjeltenAfter reading hundreds of e-mails, I have made MY decision. By pulling my opening Oct 3rd, You (ESPN) stepped on the Toes of The First Amendment Freedom of Speech, so therefore Me, My Song, and All My Rowdy Friends are OUT OF HERE. It's been a great run.
Hank Williams, Jr.By requiring that an execution be relatively painless, we necessarily protect the inmate from enduring any punishment that is comparable to the suffering inflicted on his victim. This trend, while appropriate and required by the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, actually undermines the very premise on which public approval of the retribution rationale is based.
John Paul StevensWe often seem to be swimming through such a miasma of sexual violence - in advertising, television programming, heavy metal, rap, films, and worst of all, in the home - that even First Amendment absolutists sometimes daydream about how nice it would be to have government-as-nanny just outlaw all this effluent.
Molly IvinsThere was a conservative consensus for an amendment I put forward called Trust, But Verify that would have strengthened border security on both refugees, students and those coming here. And Marco sided and I guess was more sympathetic to Chuck Schumer and to the president than he was to conservative principles.
Rand PaulPhil Robertson and his family are great citizens of the State of Louisiana. The politically correct crowd is tolerant of all viewpoints, except those they disagree with. I donโt agree with quite a bit of stuff I read in magazine interviews or see on TV. In fact, come to think of it, I find a good bit of it offensive. But I also acknowledge that this is a free country and everyone is entitled to express their views. In fact, I remember when TV networks believed in the First Amendment. It is a messed up situation when Miley Cyrus gets a laugh, and Phil Robertson gets suspended.
Bobby JindalThe media has been very bad about informing us about what is going on. They focus on surface things. They do not focus enough on the fact that the Fourth Amendment is on life support and that we need a return to transparency in government.
Nat Hentoff...[T]oday's Washington is about as attentive to the Tenth Amendment as the Unitarian Church is to the Book of Revelation.
Joseph SobranOur First Amendment expresses a far different calculus for regulating speech than for regulating nonexpressive conduct and that is as it should be. The right to swing your fist should end at the tip of my nose, but your right to express your ideas should not necessarily end at the lobes of my ears.
Alan DershowitzI am for the First Amendment from the first word to the last. I believe it means what it says.
Hugo BlackAs a young child, it became crystal clear to me that there were certain rights and privileges that other people had that my mother, my father, my grandparents, my great grandparents didn't have - that it was an ongoing struggle to realize the dream of the 14th and 15th Amendment.
John LewisThe nice men in periwigs who came up with the Fourth Amendment were recklessly naive to imagine that branches of a government, each of whose power is enhanced when the power of the other branches grows, would serve to check one another.
Ilana MercerLet them all believe whatever they want. It is pointless to go on radio shows and wrangle over mystical claims. However, such claims must not be imposed on captive children in government-owned schools. That is prohibited by the separation of church and state, a core principle in the First Amendment in America's Bill of Rights.
James A. HaughtI believe that the Framers of the Constitution made their intent clear when they wrote the First Amendment. I believe they wanted to keep the new government from endorsing one religion over another, not erase the public consciousness or common faith.
Nick RahallDonald Trump creates scapegoats in Muslims and Mexican immigrants. He calls for the use of torture. He calls for killing the innocent children and family members of terrorists. He cheers assaults on protesters. He applauds the prospect of twisting the Constitution to limit First Amendment freedom of the press. This is the very brand of anger that has led other nations into the abyss.
Mitt Romney[Asserting] important First Amendment rights ... why should [executions] be the one area that is conducted behind closed doors?... Why shouldn't executions be public?
Phil Donahue