Who said it? "He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither"

I was preparing to embark on background research for the following quotation, which I found on Ann & Curt's Excellent Adventures page immediately following a bogus quotation of James Watt.

Here's how the Mobley page presents it:

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
—Benjamin Franklin

I'm not the only one who wastes his time looking into the background of quotations, fortunately. Michael Gaynor had the scoop over at Renew America.

Mr. Franklin would be aghast to be misquoted and misused.

"Those who would give up ESSENTIAL LIBERTY to purchase a little TEMPORARY SAFETY, deserve neither LIBERTY nor SAFETY" is a motto on the title page of An Historical Review of the Constitution and Government of Pennsylvania. (1759).

This motto was attributed to Mr. Franklin in the edition of 1812.

In a letter of September 27, 1760 to David Hume, however, Mr. Franklin stated that he published this book and denied that he wrote it, other than a few remarks that were credited to the Pennsylvania Assembly, in which he served.
(Renew America)

I was mainly curious to examine the context of the Franklin quotation. I was surprised to find that Franklin probably wasn't the author since the quotation is widely used (and, as noted, I'm not the only one who wastes time researching quotations).

Read the Gaynor article for more details regarding authorship of the quotation.

The original quotation is a pretty good statement, regardless of its authorship, and at least it may be said that Mr. Mobley has the quotation close to its unaltered form, emphasizing "essential" liberty rather than liberties that are less than essential, and "temporary" safety rather than enduring safety. Many make use of the quotation without those key words, as Gaynor noted.