James Bovard Liberty Quotations

America needs fewer laws, not more prisons.

The first step in saving our liberty is to realize how much we have already lost, how we lost it, and how we will continue to lose it unless fundamental political changes occur.

If citizens wish to retain their liberty, they cannot assume that those who seek power over them are honest. Skepticism of government is one of the most important-and most forgotten-bulwarks of freedom.

There is no virtue in denying the law of gravity, and there should be no virtue in denying the limitations of government. ... The more we glorify government, the more liberties we will lose.

The only things government can do are regulate and redistribute, prohibit and penalize, confiscate and command. Are these the things that liberty is made of? Somebody else's money and an endless list of Thou Shalt Nots?

Today's citizen is obliged to find his freedom only in the narrow ruts pre-approved by his bureaucratic overlords. "Risk-free liberty" is the ideal of the Welfare State: citizens are permitted only liberties which have been declawed, defanged, neutered, certified and wrapped in benevolent restrictions.

Liberty is a political firewall that limits the damage government can do to the individual.