"To the press alone, chequered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity, over error and oppression;...to the same beneficent source, the US owe much of the lights which conducted them to the rank of a free and independent nation."

Madison later wrote, regarding freedom of the press, that "It is better to leave a few of its noxious branches, to their luxuriant growth, than by pruning them away, to injure the vigor of those yielding the proper fruits."

From James Madison's original draft of the First Amendment: "The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, to write, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty, shall be inviolable."