Liberty and Security

"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security."

-- Benjamin Franklin (1759)


Burning Books

"Whenever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings."

--Heinrich Heine

Freedom of Speech

"...the only safegard on this extraordinary government power is the public, deputizing the press as the guardians of their liberty.

"...The executive branch seeks to uproot people's lives, outside the public eye and behind closed doors. Democracies die behind closed doors. The First Amendment, through a free press, protects the people's right to know that their government acts fairly, lawfully, and accurately in deportment hearings. When the government begins closing doors, it selectively controls information rightfully belonging to the people. Selective information is misinformation.

"The framers of the First Amendment "did not trust any government to separate the true from the false for us." They protected the people against secret government."

--Judge Damon J. Keith


(from the text of a decision by the US Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals striking down a Justice Department policy to hold closed hearings on deportation, with "no visitors, no family, no press, and no confirming or denying whether such a case is on the docket.")

page by Geoffrey A. Landis, 2002