Individual 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).
When it comes to voting rights, Democrats push voter protection while Republicans shout voter fraud in a crowded polling place. Democrats think anyone who can vote should vote; Republicans think everyone who should vote can vote.
If you care about women’s rights, you can’t not vote.
The theory of relativity worked out by Mr. Einstein, which is in the domain of natural science, I believe can also be applied to the political field. Both democracy and human rights are relative concepts – and not absolute and general.
In the end, abortion is an issue of fundamental human rights. To force women to undergo pregnancy and childbirth against their will is to deprive them of the right to make basic decisions about their lives and well-being, and to give that power to the state.
I’m not guided by what Human Rights Watch says.
It is difficult to overstate the importance of the Civil Rights Act.
A parliamentary democracy that has developed its delicate balances over hundreds of years will not give up its sovereign rights.
Privacy is not for sale, and human rights should not be compromised out of fear or greed.
For nearly as long as civilization has existed, patriarchy – enforced through the rights of the firstborn son – has been the organizing principle, with few exceptions.
The hardest decisions in life are not between good and bad or right and wrong, but between two goods or two rights.
As a parent myself, I can appreciate the MPAA and what they’re supposed to do, but what happens with NC-17 is that the MPAA is basically taking away the rights of parents. They’re basically telling me that I can’t show my kids this movie if I decide they can see it.
Each American has a right to be heard, and I was proud to vote to pass the Voting Rights Advancement Act to restore vital voter protections and strengthen Virginians’ trust in our political process.
My office has been one of the most scrupulous in the country with regard to the protection of individual rights. I’ve been on record for years in law journals and books as championing the rights of the individual against the oppressive power of the state.
We should be tolerant, fair, open, and we should understand the rights that all people have in our society.
Trump’s appointed extremist judges to the federal bench, including U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, whose decisions demonstrate a judicial philosophy far more concerned with the rights of corporations than marginalized Americans.
Criticism of the Middle East should not be directed only at Saudi Arabia. Human rights abuses are happening throughout the Arab world.
Elections remind us not only of the rights but the responsibilities of citizenship in a democracy.
Equal rights for women. I agree with that concept. But we will never be free, we will never obtain equality, until we stop letting ourselves become pawns of the abortion industry. Our freedom depends on our rejection of abortion.
It is both wrong and short-sighted to believe that we can better protect our national security interests by ignoring or sidelining human rights.
It is impossible to struggle for civil rights, equal rights for blacks, without including whites. Because equal rights, fair play, justice, are all like the air: we all have it, or none of us has it. That is the truth of it.
Who needs the protection of the Bill of Rights most? The weak, the most vulnerable in society.
To all general purposes we have uniformly been one people, each individual citizen everywhere enjoying the same national rights, privileges, and protection.
You can’t be a feminist in the United States and stand up for the rights of the American woman and then say that you don’t want to stand up for the rights of Palestinian women in Palestine. It’s all connected.
We control the world basically because we are the only animals that can cooperate flexibly in very large numbers. And if you examine any large-scale human cooperation, you will always find that it is based on some fiction like the nation, like money, like human rights.
I have had the greatest respect for the institution of the Supreme Court. I have always believed it to be the last bastion of hope, particularly for the weak and the oppressed who knock at its door for the protection of their rights, often against a powerful executive.
My story is the story of thousands of children from around the world. I hope it inspires others to stand up for their rights.
I’m proud to cosponsor the Life at Conception Act which grants rights to babies at the moment they are conceived, and the Born Alive Protection Act, that will protect innocent lives who miraculously escape death.
Our strategic dialogue with China can both protect American interests and uphold our principles, provided we are honest about our differences on human rights and other issues and provided we use a mix of targeted incentives and sanctions to narrow these differences.
I don’t believe in quotas. America was founded on a philosophy of individual rights, not group rights.
The fact is, human rights victories are rarely won by powerful governments or well-armed militaries. More often than not, these battles are led by individuals and small groups of people determined to overcome wrong. Think King, Gandhi, Mandela.
I bought the rights to this book, ‘The Ploughmen,’ by a Montana writer named Kim Zupan, and I’ve written the screenplay, and I really feel pretty strong about it. It’s really hauntingly beautiful. It’s got some suspense and great drama, but it’s a real character thing.
To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker.
During past years, like frightened children, we were afraid to eat the strong meat of human rights and instead sucked the milk of civil rights from the breasts of white liberals, black Uncle Toms, and Aunt Jemimas.
I learnt about the universe. I learnt about human rights and human dignity – this was so new to me.
Any law which violates the inalienable rights of man is essentially unjust and tyrannical; it is not a law at all.
To be in a situation where you have no rights whatsoever is something I wish everybody could experience. People’s attitudes would change. It would be a better place.
The true republic: men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less.
Human trafficking robs victims of their basic human rights, and it occurs right under our noses. Many efforts have been focused in other regions of the world, but this is a major problem here at home.
I weep for the liberty of my country when I see at this early day of its successful experiment that corruption has been imputed to many members of the House of Representatives, and the rights of the people have been bartered for promises of office.
After marching across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma as a young man, John Lewis went on to become a legendary leader for civil rights alongside other giants of the movement like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth.
What are we fighting the terrorists for if we ourselves do not even stand up for democracy – civil liberties and fundamental rights – which includes independence of the judiciary?
During the 60’s, I was, in fact, very concerned about the civil rights movement.
Being a humanitarian, supporting animal rights activists, human rights activists, it’s all the same.
America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.
We’re taking on Social Security as a property rights issue. We figure that every single American has an absolute property right interest in the fruits of his or her own labor. What I work for should be my property.
In a typical history book, black Americans are mentioned in the context of slavery or civil rights. There’s so much more to the story.
For a successful revolution it is not enough that there is discontent. What is required is a profound and thorough conviction of the justice, necessity and importance of political and social rights.
Don’t be afraid – if you don’t exercise your rights, you will lose them.
The Bill of Rights isn’t some legalistic fine print. It was written to make our lives freer, more prosperous, and happier. By forsaking it, America has become no better than any other country in the world.
Without prayer, without faith in the Almighty, the civil rights movement would have been like a bird without wings.
The government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.
I think if we go back and check our record, the Negro has proven beyond a doubt that we have been more than patient in seeking our rights as American citizens.
Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.
I want to make sure that people understand that, behind this national conversation around transgender rights, there are real people who hurt when they’re mocked, who hurt when they’re discriminated against, and who just want to be treated with dignity and respect.
