Charles Evans Hughes
Charles Evans Hughes
Charles Evans Hughes, Sr.was an American statesman, lawyer, and Republican politician from New York. He served as the 36th Governor of New York, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Secretary of State, a judge on the Court of International Justice, and the 11th Chief Justice of the United States. He was the Republican nominee in the 1916 U.S. Presidential election, losing narrowly to incumbent President Woodrow Wilson...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionJudge
Date of Birth11 April 1862
CountryUnited States of America
Charles Evans Hughes quotes about
Our institutions were not devised to bring about uniformity of opinion; if they had we might well abandon hope. It is important to remember, as has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is that under its shelter many different types of life and character and opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.'
But it is recognized that punishment for the abuse of the liberty accorded to the press is essential to the protection of the public, and that the common law rules that subject the libeler to responsibility for the public offense, as well as for the private injury, are not abolished by the protection extended in our constitutions. The law of criminal libel rests upon that secure foundation. There is also the conceded authority of courts to punish for contempt when publications directly tend to prevent the proper discharge of judicial functions.
When we deal with questions relating to principles of law and their applications, we do not suddenly rise into a stratosphere of icy certainty.
Publicity is a great purifier because it sets in action the forces of public opinion, and in this country public opinion controls the courses of the nation
The liberty of the press is not confined to newspapers and periodicals. It necessarily embraces pamphlets and leaflets. These indeed have been historic weapons in the defense of liberty, as the pamphlets of Thomas Paine and others in our history abundantly attest.
The first lesson in civics is that efficient government begins at home.
We [the Government] are here not as masters but as servants, we are not here to glory in power, but to attest our loyalty to the commands and restrictions laid down by our sovereign, the people of the United States, in whose name and by whose will we exercise our brief authority.
I believe in work, hard work, and long hours of work. Men do not breakdown from overwork, but from worry and dissipation.
While democracy must have its organizations and controls, its vital breath is individual liberty.
We are under a Constitution, but the Constitution is what the judges say it is, and the judiciary is the safeguard of our property and our liberty and our property under the Constitution.
The peril of this Nation is not in any foreign foe! We, the people, are its power, its peril, and its hope.
War should be made a crime, and those who instigate it should be punished as criminals.
The Supreme Court and the Court of Appeal will take care of themselves. Look after the courts of the poor, who stand most in need of justice. The security of the republic will be found in the treatment of the poor and the ignorant. In indifference to their misery and helplessness lies disaster.
Each man begins with his own world to conquer, and his education is the measure of his conquest.