Every time you get a censor, you get a fool, and worse yet a knave, pretending to be a guardian of morality, while acting as a guardian of class greed.
Upton Sinclair (1878–1968) American writer, journalist, activist, politician
Money Writes!, ch. 22 “The Bookleggers” (1927)
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Self-quoted in "Poor Me and Pure Boston," The Nation (1927-06-29)
Quotations about:
public morality
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It must be a good thing to be good or ivrybody wudden’t be pretendin’ he was.
[It must be a good thing to be good, or everybody wouldn’t be pretending he was.]
Finley Peter Dunne (1867–1936) American humorist and journalist
Observations by Mr. Dooley, “Hypocrisy” (1902)
Ultimately, therefore, the question “whether or not we admit religious values into our public affairs” is too broad to yield a single answer. “Yes,” we create our public morality through consensus and in this country that consensus reflects to some extent religious values of a great majority of Americans. But “no,” all religiously based values don’t have an a priori place in our public morality. The community must decide if what is being proposed would be better left to private discretion than public policy; whether it restricts freedoms, and if so to what end, to whose benefit; whether it will produce a good or bad result; whether overall it will help the community or merely divide it.
Mario Cuomo (1932–2015) American politician
“Religious Belief and Public Morality,” John A. O’Brien Lecture, U. of Notre Dame (13 Sep 1984)
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