Like freedom? Enjoy these quotations related to the First Amendment, which offers the rights of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly and freedom to petition the government.

“If any one amendment can be seen as the most important, I would pick the First. It opens the door to ensuring all other rights.” — Warren E. Burger, former U.S. chief justice, 1991

“I gave up watching television 25 years ago because I liked it so much even though I couldn’t remember what I had watched the day before and could see that if I went on as a viewer my life would become a blank.” — Garrison Keillor, author, broadcaster, 2007

“In those wretched countries where a man cannot call his tongue his own, he can scarce call anything his own.” — Benjamin Franklin, U.S. statesman, 1722

“The wonderful things about books is that they allow us to enter imaginatively into someone else’s life.” — Katherine Paterson, author, 1991

“Journalists have never been in more danger, nor have they ever been more important.” — Peter Arnett, journalist, author, 1993

“It is certainly no part of the practice of religion to compel others to the practice of religion.” — Tertullian, Christian author, c. 200 A.D.

“Books won’t stay banned. They won’t burn. Ideas won’t go to jail.” — Alfred Whitney Griswold, writer, educator, 1959

“While both religion and the media benefit from the First Amendment, church and press are, at best, uncomfortable allies.” — Judith Buddenbaum, journalism professor, Colorado State University.

— Quotes from First Amendment Calendar, produced by the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center, 2009