And to penalize, therefore, the critic is not only to poison the moral foundations of the state, but to make it extremely difficult, when peace comes, for both government and the mass of citizens to resume the habits of normal decency.
Laski warns that punishing critics undermines the moral fabric of the state and hinders future decency.
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More from Harold J. Laski
We grant it in religion to deny it in politics; we grant it in politics, to deny it in economic matters.
The intolerance may be Catholic, when it insists that a unity of outlook is essential for the preservation of society; or it may be Protestant when, as with Calvin and the Socinians, it holds that the blasphemous nature of the belief…
To deny novelty or grievance a right of expression is a certain, if, indeed, an ultimate, validation of the truth they contain.
The only way to deal with novelty is to understand it, and the only way to deal with grievance is to seek a remedy for the complaint it embodies.
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