Popular quotes about Rights! Wisdom and inspiration are here!
I went to my first civil rights rally when I was 17 years old. I was a little skinny blond kid, scared to death, marching against the KKK in South Georgia. And I have never stopped marching in protests since. Not ever. I mean, LGBT rights, women's rights, the rights of people of color... I'm your guy. I'm going to be out there marching!
Pauley PerretteI would rather people not smoke. I certainly appreciate the fact that smoking is not legal in restaurants and bars. That used to stop me from going out at night because you'd go someplace and your clothes would reek and you wouldn't enjoy the experience and that affects your rights. It's always a question. Whenever you are talking about these issues, it's not a question of restricting rights. It's a question of restricting whose rights, and providing for whose rights and that's a tricky balance.
Ian BremmerWhat will solve our problems is a specific set of ideas built on bedrock principles that made America the greatest nation to begin with and applying those principles to the unique challenges of this new century. And those principles are not complicated. It begins with a notion that this nation was founded on a powerful spiritual principle, that our rights do not come from government. Our rights do not come from our laws. Our rights do not come from our leaders. Our rights come from God.
Marco RubioLook at what I've done my entire life. I have been working on behalf of civil rights, women's rights, human rights for years and I know how challenging it is to change our political system and I have the highest regard for those who have put themselves on the line.
Hillary ClintonIf a country doesn't recognize minority rights and human rights, including women's rights, you will not have the kind of stability and prosperity that is possible.
Hillary ClintonThat term, 'human rights', makes me ill.Human rights are only for 'humans', therefore for the West. And for the rest of the Planet: there, the 'human rights' are used to discredit uncomfortable, even 'hostile' governments through countless implants like NGOs.
Andre VltchekAs property, honestly obtained, is best secured by an equality of rights, so ill-gotten property depends for protection on a monopoly of rights. He who has robbed another of his property, will next endeavor to disarm him of his rights, to secure that property; for when the robber becomes the legislator he believes himself secure.
Thomas PaineHuman rights are fundamental rights, they are the minimum, the very least we demand. Too often, they become the goal itself. What should be the minimum becomes the maximum - all we are supposed to expect - but human rights aren't enough. The goal is, and must always be, justice.
Arundhati RoyThe very idea of law originates in men's natural rights. There is no other standard, than natural rights, by which civil law can be measured. Law has always been the name of that rule or principle of justice, which protects those rights. Thus we speak of natural law.
Lysander SpoonerI have no use for "men's rights," any more than I have any use for "women's rights," but let us ask: Who was it that decided it was a good idea to politicize love, sex and marriage? Who spent the past four decades proclaiming that "the personal is political," so that every office flirtation and every petty domestic quarrel is a federal civil rights violation? The damned feminists, that's who.
Robert Stacy McCainIndividual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has no right to vote away the rights of a minority; the political function of rights is precisely to protect minorities from oppression by majorities (and the smallest minority on earth is the individual).
Ayn RandTo ask about the 'source' of rights or morals assumes an erreous conclusion. To ask about the source of morals is to assume that such a source exists. As if it existed outside of human constructed systems. The 'source' is the human ability to learn from experience and to entrench rights in our laws and in our consciousness. Our rights come from our long history of wrongs.
Alan DershowitzWe must go beyond the arrogance of human rights. We must go beyond the ignorance of civil rights. We must step into the reality of natural rights because all of the natural world has a right to existence and we are only a small part of it. There can be no trade-off.
John TrudellContrary to the claims of the supporters of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the sponsors of H.Res. 676, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not improve race relations or enhance freedom. Instead, the forced integration dictated by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 increased racial tensions while diminishing individual liberty.
Ron Paul[You have Rights] antecedent to all earthly governments: Rights, that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; Rights, derived from the Great Legislator of the universe.
John AdamsI know nothing of man's rights, or woman's rights; human rights are all that I recognize.
Sarah Moore GrimkeNot only are the philosophies of animal rights and animal welfare separated by irreconcilable differences... the enactment of animal welfare measures actually impedes the achievement of animal rights... Welfare reforms, by their very nature, can only serve to retard the pace at which animal rights goals are achieved.
Gary L. FrancioneFirst, individual rights cannot be sacrificed for the sake of the general good, and second, the principles of justice that specify these rights cannot be premised on any particular vision of the good life. What justifies the rights is not that they maximize the general welfare or otherwise promote the good, but rather that they comprise a fair framework within which individuals and groups can choose their own values and ends, consistent with a similar liberty for others.
Michael SandelPositive rights are the right to shelter, the right to education, the right to health care, the right to a living wage. These things are - these are, I would call them, more properly, political rights rather than positive rights. And they are extremely tricky, because now we are dealing with things that are zero sum.
P. J. O'RourkeLook at the Israel-Palestine conflict, for example. If you look at a map from 1947 to now, you'll see that Israel has gobbled up almost all of Palestinian land with its illegal settlements. To talk about justice in that battle, you have to talk about those settlements. But, if you just talk about human rights, then you can say, "Oh, Hamas violates human rights," "Israel violates human rights." Ergo, both are bad.
Arundhati RoyMy life is about being a civil rights activist. That's my life. Whoever you are, everyone, we either have civil rights or we don't. It's for everyone.
Pauley PerretteShould things go wrong at any time, the people will set them to rights by the peaceable exercise of their elective rights.
Thomas JeffersonDr. King organized the Poor People's Campaign in 1968 to shut down Washington, D.C. and force legislators to tackle poverty. His efforts to shift focus from civil to silver rights were interrupted by his untimely death. He fought ardently for Black rights, but he also recognized financial literacy as the key to an America that was truly free for all people.
John Hope BryantSince the ousting and capture of Saddam Hussein by U.S. forces, civil rights and personal freedoms have been restored in Iraq, as well as equal rights to all, not just to Saddams entourage of terrorists.
Jim GerlachThe problem is sitting in the birthplace of Islam, in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, where this interpretation of Islam has gone out into the world over the last four decades, creating militancy groups from Indonesia, to now, San Bernardino, California, vicious attack. We have to take back the faith. And we have to take it back with the principles of peace, social justice, and human rights, women's rights, and secularize governance.
Chuck ToddWorking in a situation with men and women, and seeing women take on roles equal to the roles taken by men made you understand that, "Hey, these people can do things too." And I think it made me and other people in the movement realize that we're living in a community of equals. And that among those equals, they have equal rights. And we ought to respect their rights if they respected ours.
Julian BondThe entire future of marriage rests with Justice Anthony Kennedy, the man who declared in Citizens United that corporations are people with constitutional rights. I just hope he doesn't do anything rash, like declare that homosexuals are people with constitutional rights.
Stephen ColbertDuring the 19th-century struggle for womens rights in America, many saw a competition between rights for black people and those for women.
Karen DeCrowI think fundamentally, the real power behind the anti-choice movement in regard to abortion and the opposition to the rights of LGBT Americans is fundamentally religious. I know that there are people who are secularists who have problems with the rights of gay people and problems with reproductive choice, but frankly those people are few in number.
Barry W. LynnProperty rights can improve a woman's ability to stand up to violence in the home. You might think education and employment are important because they give women exit options, but property is as well. Give women equal property rights to inherited land, then they have an asset they can take out of the marriage. This gives husbands strong incentives to not beat them.
Martha C. NussbaumI want to stress again that human rights are not peripheral to the foreign policy of the United States. Our pursuit of human rights is part of a broad effort to use our great power and our tremendous influence in the service of creating a better world, a world in which human beings can live in peace, in freedom, and with their basic needs adequately met.
Jimmy CarterOut of the performance of duties flow rights, and those that knew and performed their duties came naturally by their rights.
Mahatma GandhiWhen you sign with a label, they do insist upon certain rights, and if you have a competent attorney, your rights will be protected.
Tommy ShawWhen you vote, vote for those who are not warmongers, and vote for those who respect human rights. When you see a president who doesn't respect human rights, don't vote for that person.
Shirin EbadiThe gay rights movement of recent years has been an inspiring victory for humanity and it is in the tradition of the civil rights movement when I was a young boy in the South, the women's suffrage movement when my mother was a young woman in Tennessee, the abolition movement much farther back, and the anti-apartheid movement when I was in the House of Representatives. All of these movements have one thing in common: the opposition to progress was rooted in an outdated understanding of morality.
Al GoreThe banks don't have anything - no rights whatsoever. The banks are shareholders of SLEC, and SLEC has no rights. I am the CEO of Formula One Management and Formula One Administration, which runs the business in F1. From this point of view, I own F1.
Bernie EcclestoneIt is also important to respect the fact that Iran is a signatory to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which treaty spells out the rights and obligations of signatures to the treaty and therefore that we canโt deny Iran the rights due to it as a signature of the NPT.
Thabo MbekiI've heard the government say many nice things. But it did make some gestures, like writing human rights protection into the constitution - that surprised me. And it improved the conditions for foreign journalists: It used to be impossible for you to meet with me personally. But there still hasn't been a real improvement in the human rights situation.
Liu XiaoboRacism is an attack on the very notion of the universality of human rights. It systematically denies certain people the enjoyment of their full human rights because of their colour, race, ethnicity, descent or national origin.
Irene KhanI want to know how these very people who are against war because of loss of life can possibly be the same people who are for abortion? They are the same people who are for animal rights, but they are not for the rights of the unborn.
Jim GibbonsWe have to recognise that rights are being violated. The United Nations actually filed a report that found that that was the case, that mass surveillance is a violation of rights.
Edward SnowdenThe idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire.
Rick SantorumCapitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned.
Ayn Rand... the modern state masks itself in moral ideologies which obscure its actual conduct. One of the most compelling and insidious of these ideologies is the doctrine of natural rights. It was to secure these rights that the modern state was invented in the first place, and it is impossible, especially for Americans, not to be seduced by the doctrine. But it is nonetheless a philosophical superstition.
Donald LivingstonWe need to finally accept that all sentient creatures are deserving of basic rights. I define basic rights as this -the ability to pursue life without having someone else's will involuntarily forced upon you.
MobyThe social model of the Bolsheviks failed, as will any model that denies individual rights, intellectual freedom, and freedom of competing political parties. Without these freedoms and rights, there is no motivation for people to work. Such a system cannot be sustained, especially in light of the technological revolution of the information era.
Mikhail Gorbachev