The freedom of speech and the freedom of the press have not been granted to the people in order that they may say things which please, and which are based upon accepted thought, but the right to say the things which displease.
SAMUEL GOMPERSIn the last analysis, the welfare of the workers depends upon their own initiative. Whatever is done under the guise of philanthropy or social morality which in any way lessens initiative is the greatest crime that can be committed against the toilers.
More Samuel Gompers Quotes
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You can’t weigh the soul of a man with a bar of pig-iron.
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The right to say the things which convey the new and yet unexpected thoughts, the right to say things, even though they do a wrong.
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What does labor want? We want more schoolhouses and less jails; more books and less arsenals; more learning and less vice; more leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures.
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Doing for people what they can and ought to do for themselves is a dangerous experiment.
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The periods of unemployment accompanying depression in the business cycle . . . present a challenge to all our claims to progress, humanity, and civilization.
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In the last analysis, the welfare of the workers depends upon their own initiative. Whatever is done under the guise of philanthropy or social morality which in any way lessens initiative is the greatest crime that can be committed against the toilers.
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Where trade unions are most firmly organized, there are the rights of the people most respected.
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The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce.
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Show me the country that has no strikes and I’ll show you the country in which there is no liberty.
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Workingmen are at the foundation of society.
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Our mission has been the protection of the wage-worker, now; to increase his wages; to cut hours off the long workday, which was killing him; to improve the safety and the sanitary conditions of the workshop.
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W.Z. Foster {head of the American Communist Party}, who had no money, went to Moscow and came back and announced that he was building a great secret machine to undermine the American labor movement and turn it over to the Red International, owned by Lenin.
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There is not a right too long denied to which we do not aspire in order to achieve; there is not a wrong too long endured that we are not determined to abolish.
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To be free, the workers must have choice. To have choice they must retain in their own hands the right to determine under what conditions they will work.
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To make manhood more noble, womanhood more beautiful, and childhood more happy and bright.
SAMUEL GOMPERS