Floyd Abrams

“It's not like learning how to hit a curve ball in baseball.”

“When I began we did not really have a lot of First Amendment law. It is really surprising to think of it this way, but a lot of the law - most of the law that relates to the First Amendment freedom of the press in America - is really within living memory.”

“It is within the last quarter century or thirty years. And a lot of that law has turned out to be very, very protective of the press and the public's right to know.”

“It has something to do with the facts and the law and who the judges are. So I think lawyers sometimes exaggerate their role in winning and losing. Lawyers do have a role, and a major role, but they're not the only players in this game.”

“This is going right to the police. So, it's a very dangerous precedent.”

“The government would be able to go to court with respect to newspaper articles, broadcast pieces and the like that they thought were bad or harmful or even against the government and try to block them.”

“I think that the very fact that CBS fought and fought and fought in Texas, in New York.”

“I am really impressed by lawyers who write books and tell us that they never lost a case. Most lawyers who have never lost a case have not had enough hard cases. But there are very difficult cases out there.”

“I try to do that in this book without preaching - to try to do as you just said that you really have to defend the First Amendment rights of everybody.”

“Here we have a situation where a defendant in a case agrees to an interview with Dan Rather. It happened to be not confidential. But it was an interview with Dan Rather.”

“There are some circumstances in which the First Amendment interest comes up against another interest that is really important and in which we have to make a decision in a particular case as to which is more important.”