Free Press Quotes

“Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.”
― Edward Snowden

“Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets..”
― Napoleon Bonaparte

“The only security of all is in a free press.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“Freedom of speech gives us the right to offend others, whereas freedom of thought gives them the choice as to whether or not to be offended.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“Try to be pleasant to one another, get plenty of fresh air, read a good book now and then, depose your government when it suspends the free press, try to use the mechanism of the state to adjudicate fairly and employ diplomatic means wherever possible to avoid armed conflict.”
― Jasper Fforde, The Big Over Easy

“Newspapers are not made any longer by news or journalism. They are made by sheer weight of money expressed in free gift schemes. They serve not the interests of the many, but the vested interests of the few.”
― Oswald Mosley, Fascism: 100 Questions Asked and Answered

“Fascism thrives in obscurity and darkness.”
― DaShanne Stokes

“A free press can, of course, be good or bad, but, most certainly without freedom, the press will never be anything but bad.”
― Albert Camus

“It is the press, above all, which wages a positively fanatical and slanderous struggle, tearing down everything which can be regarded as a support of national independence, cultural elevation, and the economic independence of the nation.”
― Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf

“The Press will not be free to tell lies. That is not freedom for the people, but a tyranny over their minds and souls. Much humbug is talked on this subject. What is press freedom? In practice it means the right of a dew millionaires to corner newspaper shares on the stock exchange and to voice their own opinions and interests, irrespective of the truth or of the national interest.”
― Oswald Mosley, Fascism: 100 Questions Asked and Answered

“The media, like anything else, can be bought. Everything, it seems, has its price. Even the free press.”
― Lance Morcan, The Orphan Conspiracies: 29 Conspiracy Theories from The Orphan Trilogy

“Unless you have a free press in your country, there is no need to buy newspapers and there is no need to watch the news because there is no need to listen to the lies! And you already have one real information: You are being deceived by the people you are governed! This is an enough information for you!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“Being a patriot doesn't mean prioritizing service to government above all else. Being a patriot means knowing when to protect your country, knowing when to protect your Constitution, knowing when to protect your countrymen, from the violations of and encroachments of adversaries. And those adversaries don't have to be foreign countries.”
― Edward Snowden

“The United States, almost alone today, offers the liberties and the privileges and the tools of freedom. In this land the citizens are still invited to write their plays and books, to paint their pictures, to meet for discussion, to dissent as well as to agree, to mount soapboxes in the public square, to enjoy education in all subjects without censorship, to hold court and judge one another, to compose music, to talk politics with their neighbors without wondering whether the secret police are listening, to exchange ideas as well as goods, to kid the government when it needs kidding, and to read real news of real events instead of phony news manufactured by a paid agent of the state. This is a fact and should give every person pause.”
― E.B. White, One Man's Meat

“The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state: but this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published. Every freeman has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public: to forbid this, is to destroy the freedom of the press: but if he publishes what is improper, mischievous, or illegal, he must take the consequence of his own temerity.”
― William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, Volume 4: A Facsimile of the First Edition of 1765-1769

“It struck me that there is a reason James Madison put freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the very first amendment. If we can't speak out, if we cannot challenge those in power, there is no guaranteeing the rights that follow.”
― Jonathan Karl, Front Row at the Trump Show

“Mr. Orage, one of the most active and intelligent reformers for the last generation in England, attempted this very thing. He, in his little intellectual review which was supported by so brilliant a group of writers for so many years, published week after week the ingredients of the English patent medicines and the cost of those ingredients. Not a single one of the newspapers followed suit, or dared publish so much as the fact that Orage was thus acting courageously in his own limited sphere for the public good.”
― Hilaire Belloc

“He had heard especially promising things about Philadelphia--the lively capital of that young nation. It was said to be a city with a good-enough shipping port, central to the eastern coast of the country, filled with pragmatic Quakers, pharmacists, and hardworking farmers. It was rumored to be a place without haughty aristocrats (unlike Boston), and without pleasure-fearing puritans (unlike Connecticut), and without troublesome self-minted feudal princes (unlike Virginia). The city had been founded on the sound principles of religious tolerance, a free press, and good landscaping, by William Penn--a man who grew tree saplings in bathtubs, and who had imagined his metropolis as a great nursery of both plants and ideas. Everyone was welcome in Philadelphia, absolutely everyone--except, of course, the Jews. Hearing all this, Henry suspected Philadelphia to be a vast landscape of unrealized profits, and he aimed to turn the place to his advantage.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert, The Signature of All Things

“No use complaining about the world's freest press-we fought for it, we got it, now we have to live with the nonsense that it spews out.”
― F. H. Batacan

“A free press is one where it’s ok to state the conclusion you’re led to by the evidence.”
― Bill Moyers

“The ability of a free and independent press to hold political leaders accountable is what makes open government possible—it is the heartbeat of democracy. Trump is intent on stilling, or slowing down, that heartbeat. This is a gift to dictators, and coming from a chief executive of the United States, cause for shame.”
― Madeleine K. Albright, Fascism: A Warning

“I am sure because I am confident in the idea of the United States of America. I believe that the combination of checks and balances and a free press and our democratically elected representatives will expose charlatans. I believe in the good sense of the American people, and I know in my soul that truth will win out.”
― Jake Tapper, The Hellfire Club

“Independence of the media, freedom of the press, freedom of expression and the right of access to information are vital if the media are to be able to perform their watchdog function in a democratic society governed by the rule of law.”
― Oscar Auliq-Ice

“If the media are to carry out their role as a fourth power in society, the necessary framework must be in place, including legislation that protects the confidentiality of sources and does not allow censorship.”
― Oscar Auliq-Ice

“Free and independent media underpin any vibrant democracy.”
― Oscar Auliq-Ice

“İdareli bir demokrasi muhteşem bir şeydir, Manuel, idare edenler için... en büyük gücü de ‘Özgür’ün ‘sorumluluk sahibi ‘ olarak tanımlandığı ve neyin ‘sorumsuz ‘ olduğunu idarecilerin belirlediği ‘özgür basın’dır.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

“No custodian of the truth should have to fear their deliverance of the facts.”
― Jacob Riggs

“Having a free press doesn’t mean anyone cares.”
― Nell Zink, The Wallcreeper

“Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell.”
― Hugo L. Black

“It was a familiar pantomime--the free press, deplored yet admired. Under their vests the senators were secretly glad that they were unable to dislodge a couple of American photographers. It was what the hearing was about, really--the photographers, squatting imperturbably in front of the men who were plotting to win a war that would preserve for photographers the right to squat imperturbably.”
― E.B. White