Dissent and dissenters have no monopoly on freedom. They must tolerate opposition. They must accept dissent from their dissent.

—Abe Fortas

If you stand up and be counted, from time to time you may get yourself knocked down. But remember this: A man flattened by an opponent can get up again. A man flattened by conformity stays down for good.

—Thomas J. Watson, Jr

Men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.

—Thucydides

The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opponents than from his fervent supporters.

—Walter Lippmann

What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?

—Thomas Jefferson

The wise man always throws himself on the side of his assailants. It is more his interest than it is theirs to find his weak point.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.

—Baltasar Gracián y Morales

Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.

—Alexander Hamilton

In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone.

—John Kenneth Galbraith

Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence.

—Albert Einstein

We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship.

—E.M. Forster