If we use etymology to trace the origins of the words, we find that liberty comes to mean the condition of a free man, the absence of restraint— in positive and singular terms: permission. Freedom is more or less a compound of Olde English/Old Germanic words; "free" means to be exempt from, not in bondage, or joy, peace, kinship, love while "dom" means statute or judgment. To draw the difference between liberty and freedom, the former means permission while the latter means a statute of exemption or peace. Furthermore, as we have already gone over, liberty historically means the condition of a free man, so we can draw such a distinction: liberty is a condition dependent on how free man is.
Modern western philosophy (from the pre-Declaration era to the post-French Revolution era) left liberty highly in debate. Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau could agree on few things, but one agreement was that the establishment of government is natural to human nature and a necessity. The weak need protection from the strong in the state of nature which is, in a nutshell, the anarchic state of affairs before society comes to this consensus (an all too brief definition of "state of nature" for those not privy to it). In essence, the social order rising from the state of nature sacrifices certain freedoms for some to ensure basic freedoms for all.
We can see, now, that because liberty (permission) necessitates some freedoms (statutes of exemption) to be exchanged, that there may be some actions that cannot be had on part of the individual. So the next time someone tells you that "they have the liberty…" you can tell them one of two things: you can be a coy smart-ass, cut them off at those words and say, "oh, so do I!" or you can be equally as bodacious by correcting them, "what you mean is that you have the freedom… and, actually, chances are, you don't." However absurd the law may be, no one is exempt from it, and it seems our definitions of freedom and liberty have made confusing issues for us ever since civil liberties have been an issue in this country (separately, any debate on the definitions of "liberty", "freedom", and "equality" leads to an undermining of what, or who, defines a human).
To the First Amendment lovers— a professor of American Government or Civil Liberties would know right off what a brief Google search refreshed my memory of, but not anything can be said (much less done). Among the "speech" not protected by the amendment are: hate speech, speech/coercion leading others to commit illegal activity, material support, public speech made in the conduct of public duty, slander/libel/defamation, plagiarism or publishing confidential information, and true threats. Like most of our mothers tell us when we are young, it would be most advisable to think before we say— in the case of most, if one feels as though they ought to remind others of their freedoms, there is a good chance that they may not actually have the freedom to do so (though this often goes unpunished— think of all the arrests that would have to be made if everyone stating President Obama is not an American were to be punished!)
The subject of liberty is a very broad one which cannot truly be addressed on all the levels required to clarify for everyone once and for all. Liberty is sometimes seen as a very individual concern, a subjective matter, and as much as so many wish this were not true, it, in fact, may be. Considering the vastness of what liberty actually is and, ironically, the limitation of its understanding, it would come as no surprise that mastering the meaning would come differently to every person as snowflakes do to the ground. If we also consider the aforementioned "state of nature" argument, then this can only make more sense in that if everyone has their own sense of justice, then they will conduct themselves according to their own sense of liberty— morality not being a universal will show action on the part of others in a variety of ways.
~Joe
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