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I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of [hard-core pornography] material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description; and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that.

— Potter Stewart

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More quotes by Potter Stewart

Censorship reflects a society's lack of confidence in itself. It is a hallmark of an authoritarian regime.

Abortion is inherently different from other medical procedures because no other procedure involves the purposeful termination of a potential life.

But just because you have a right to do something doesn’t mean it’s right to do it.

The Law And Potter Stewart: An Interview With Justice Potter Stewart (1983)

For when everything is classified, then nothing is classified and the system becomes one to be disregarded by the cynical or the careless and to be manipulated by those intent on self-protection or self-promotion.

The Fourth Amendment and the personal rights it secures have a long history. At the very core stands the right of a man to retreat into his own home and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Potter Stewart (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.