The real power in America is held by a fast-emerging new Oligarchy of pimps and preachers who see no need for Democracy or fairness or even trees, except maybe the ones in their own yards, and they don’t mind admitting it. They worship money and power and death. Their ideal solution to all the nation’s problems would be another 100 Year War.
Hunter S. Thompson (1937-2005) American journalist, writer
Kingdom of Fear, “Memo from the Sports Desk” (2003)
(Source)
Quotations about:
fairness
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
We should esteem virtue though in a foe, and abhor vice though in a friend.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
Essay (1711-12-08), The Spectator, No. 243
(Source)
Home education should include not only the etiquette rules necessary to navigate life, but the underlying principles of manners. These include respect (such as addressing people as they wish to be addressed), fairness (granting others the privileges one claims for oneself) and congeniality (not using threats as an argument).
Judith Martin (b. 1938) American author, journalist, etiquette expert [a.k.a. Miss Manners]
“Miss Manners,” syndicated column (2015-03-01)
(Source)
This is often whittled down to "The underlying principles of manners -- respect, fairness, and congeniality."
The principle underlying every society is justice, for yourself and for others. If you are to love your neighbour as yourself, neighbour as yourself, it’s only fair to love yourself as much as you love your neighbour.
[Le principe de toute société est de se rendre justice à soi-même et aux autres. Si l’on doit aimer son prochain comme soi-même, il est au moins aussi juste de s’aimer comme son prochain.]
Nicolas Chamfort (1741-1794) French writer, epigrammist (b. Nicolas-Sébastien Roch)
Products of Perfected Civilization [Produits de la Civilisation Perfectionée], Part 1 “Maxims and Thoughts [Maximes et Pensées],” ch. 5, ¶ 321 (1795) [tr. Parmée (2003), ¶ 205]
(Source)
See Matthew. (Source (French)). Alternate translations:The one great social principle is to be just both to yourself and to others. If you must love your neighbour as yourself, it is at least as fair to love yourself as your neighbour.
[tr. Hutchinson (1902)]Justice to oneself and to others is the first principle of all Society; and if we should love our neighbour as ourself, it is quite as just that we should love ourself as much as our neighbour.
[tr. Mathers (1926)]The principle of all society is to do justice to oneself and to others. If one should love one’s neighbor as oneself, it is at least equally just to love oneself as one does one’s neighbor.
[tr. Merwin (1969)]The principle of all society is to do justice to oneself and to others. If it is right to love the person next to us as ourselves, it is at least as right to love ourselves as much as the people next to us.
[tr. Siniscalchi (1994)]
I continue to urge peace. Even an unjust peace is better than the most just of wars against one’s countrymen.
[Equidem ad pacem hortari non desino; quae vel iniusta utilior est quam iustissimum bellum cum civibus.]
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Epistulae ad Atticum [Letters to Atticus], Book 7, Letter 14, sec. 3 (7.14.3) (49 BC) [tr. Shackleton Bailey (1968), # 138]
(Source)
See also this letter from 46 BC.(Source (Latin)). Alternate translations:For my part, I never cease urging peace, which, however unfair, is better than the justest war in the world.
[tr. Shuckburgh (1900), #309]As for me, I cease not to advocate peace. It may be on unjust terms, but even so it is more expedient than the justest of civil wars.
[tr. Winstedt (Loeb) (1913)]
Dessous roared with laughter. “Telman! I can’t believe I’m having to tell you this, but life isn’t fair!”
“No, the world isn’t fair, the universe isn’t fair. Physics, chemistry and mathematics, they aren’t fair. Or unfair, for that matter. Fairness is an idea, and only conscious creatures have ideas. That’s us. We have ideas about right and wrong. We invent the idea of justice so that we can judge whether something is good or bad. We develop morality. We create rules to live by and call them laws, all to make life more fair.”
Any peace, even the most inequitable, should be preferred to the most righteous war.
[Iniquissimam pacem iustissimo bello anteferrem.]
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Epistulae ad Familiares [Letters to Friends], Book 6, Letter 6, sec. 5 (6.6.5), to Aulus Cæcina (46 BC) [tr. Shuckburgh (1899), #486]
(Source)
On his efforts to prevent a civil war between Caesar and Pompeius. See also this letter (49 BC)
(Source (Latin)). Alternate translation:Peace: the which, though it were accompanied with unequall conditions, yet I preferred it before warre, which on our behalfe was most just.
[tr. Webbe (1620)]Contests of this kind, tho' ever so justly founded, even the most disadvantageous terms of accommodation were preferable to having recourse to arms.
[tr. Melmoth (1753), 9.34]Why I would choose the most unfair peace in preference to the fairest of wars.
[tr. Jeans (1880), # 91]A peace even on the most unfavourable terms was preferable to the most righteous of wars.
[tr. Williams (Loeb) (1928)][...] the most inequitable peace as preferable to the most righteous of wars.
[tr. Shackleton Bailey (1978), # 234]I would prefer the most unfair peace to the justest war.
[tr. @sententiq (2012)]
“A fair day’s-wages for a fair day’s-work:” it is as just a demand as Governed men ever made of Governing. It is the everlasting right of man. Indisputable as Gospels, as arithmetical multiplication-tables: it must and will have itself fulfilled.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Past and Present, Book 1, ch. 3 “Manchester Insurrection” (1843)
(Source)
We are firm believers in the maxim that for all right judgment of any man or thing it is useful, nay, essential, to see his good qualities before pronouncing on his bad.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
“Goethe,” Foreign Review No. 3 (1828-08)
(Source)
Reviewing Goethe's Sämmtliche Werke, Vollständige Ausgabe Letzter Hand (1827). Reprinted in Carlyle, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays (1845).
Hunt out and talk about the good that is in the other fellow’s church, not the bad, and you will do away with all this religious hatred you hear so much of nowadays.
You could say to the universe this is not fair. And the universe would say: Oh, isn’t it? Sorry.
Legitimacy is based on three things. First of all, the people who are asked to obey authority have to feel like they have a voice — that if they speak up, they will be heard. Second, the law has to be predictable. There has to be a reasonable expectation that the rules tomorrow are going to be roughly the same as the rules today. And third, the authority has to be fair. It can’t treat one group differently from another.
Malcolm Gladwell (b. 1963) Anglo-Canadian journalist, author, public speaker
David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants (2013)
(Source)
Life, after we’d had a few millennia to observe it, turned out to be dreadfully unfair, so we invented sports.
Barbara Holland (1933-2010) American author
(Attributed)
Fairness for everyone would be possible only if everyone’s interests were the same, if everyone were in agreement as to what baseline considerations must be in place for a procedure to be labeled “fair.” But if that were the case, the question of fairness would never be raised. It is raised precisely because everyone’s interests are not the same, and since different interests will generate different notions of fairness (the debate between those who call for equality of access and those who call of equality of opportunity is an example), any regime of fairness will always be unfair in the eyes of those for whom it was not designed.
Stanley Fish (b. 1938) American literary theorist, legal scholar, author
There’s No Such Thing as Free Speech, And It’s A Good Thing, Too, Part 1, ch. 5 (1994)
(Source)
Those who so act and so live as to give proof of loyalty and uprightness, of fairness and generosity; who are free from all passion, caprice, and insolence, and have great strength of character — men like those just mentioned — such men let us consider good, as they were accounted good in life, and also entitled to be called by that term because, in as far as that is possible for man, they follow Nature, who is the best guide to good living.
[Qui ita se gerunt, ita vivunt, ut eorum probetur fides integritas aequitas1 liberalitas, nec sit in eis ulla cupiditas libido audacia, sintque magna constantia, ut ei fuerunt, modo quos nominavi, hos viros bonos, ut habiti sunt, sic etiam appellandos putemus, quia sequantur, quantum homines possunt, naturam optimam bene vivendi ducem.]
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Laelius De Amicitia [Laelius on Friendship], ch. 5, part 3 (5.3) / sec. 19 (44 BC) [tr. Falconer (1923)]
(Source)
Original Latin. Alternate translations:Those who so conduct themselves, and so live that their honor, their integrity, their justice, and liberality are approved; so that there is not in them any covetousness, or licentiousness, or boldness; and that they are of great consistency, as those men whom I have mentioned above; -- let us consider these worthy of the appellation of good men, as they have been accounted such because they follow (as far as men are able) nature, which is the best guide of a good life.
[tr. Edmonds (1871)]Those who so conduct themselves, so live, that their good faith, integrity, equity, and kindness win approval, who are entirely free from avarice, lust, and the infirmities of a hasty temper, and in whom there is perfect consistency of character; in fine, men like those whom I have named, while they are regarded as good, ought to be so called, because to the utmost of human capacity they follow Nature, who is the best guide in living well.
[tr. Peabody (1887)]We mean then by the "good" those whose actions and lives leave no question as to their honour, purity, equity, and liberality; who are free from greed, lust, and violence; and who have the courage of their convictions. The men I have just named may serve as examples. Such men as these being generally accounted “good,” let us agree to call them so, on the ground that to the best of human ability they follow nature as the most perfect guide to a good life.
[tr. Shuckburgh (1909)]Those who comport themselves in such a way, who live in such a way that their loyalty, integrity, fairness and generosity are proven, such that there is no desire, lust, and insolence in them, and such that they have great steadfastness of character (like those whom I named just before), we consider ought indeed to be called good men (as is customary), because they follow (as much as humans can) nature -- the best leader in proper living.
[Source]
Life isn’t fair, but government must be.
Ann Richards (1933-2006) American politician [Dorothy Ann Willis Richards]
Inauguration speech, San Antonio, Texas (15 Jan 1991)
As reported in the San Antonio Express-News (16 Jan). In the Houston Chronicle, same date, it was quoted as "Life is not fair, but government absolutely must be." See here for more discussion.
Always it is, that the hearts in the younger men are frivolous,
but when an elder man is among them, he looks behind him
and in front, so that all comes out far better for both sides.[Αἰεὶ δ’ ὁπλοτέρων ἀνδρῶν φρένες ἠερέθονται·
οἷς δ’ ὁ γέρων μετέῃσιν ἅμα πρόσσω καὶ ὀπίσσω
λεύσσει, ὅπως ὄχ’ ἄριστα μετ’ ἀμφοτέροισι γένηται.]Homer (fl. 7th-8th C. BC) Greek author
The Iliad [Ἰλιάς], Book 3, l. 108ff (3.108-110) [Menelaus] (c. 750 BC) [tr. Lattimore (1951)]
(Source)
Alt. trans.:All young men’s hearts are still unstaid; but in those well-weigh'd deeds
An old man will consent to pass things past, and what succeeds
He looks into, that he may know, how best to make his way
Through both the fortunes of a fact, and will the worst obey.
[tr. Chapman (1611), ll. 113-16]And youth itself an empty wavering state:
Cool age advances, venerably wise,
Turns on all hands its deep-discerning eyes;
Sees what befell, and what may yet befall,
Concludes from both, and best provides for all.
[tr. Pope (1715-20)]Young men are ever of unstable mind;
But when an elder interferes, he views
Future and past together, and insures
The compact, to both parties, uninfringed.
[tr. Cowper (1791), ll. 124-27]For the minds of younger men are ever fluctuating; but for those among whom a senior is present, he looks at the same time both backward and forward, in order that the best results may accrue to both parties.
[tr. Buckley (1860)]For young men's spirits are too quickly stirr'd;
But in the councils check'd by rev'rend age,
Alike are weigh'd the future and the past,
And for all int'rests due provision made.
[tr. Derby (1864), ll. 130-34]Young men's minds are light as air, but when an old man comes he looks before and after, deeming that which shall be fairest upon both sides.
[tr. Butler (1898)]Ever unstable are the hearts of the young; but in whatsoever an old man taketh part, he looketh both before and after, that the issue may be far the best for either side.
[tr. Murray (1924), #95]The younger men
are changeable; he in his age among them,
looking before and after, can see clearly
what shall be in the interests of all.
[tr. Fitzgerald (1974), l. 128ff]The minds of the younger men are always flighty,
but let an old man stand his ground among them,
one who can see the days behind, the days ahead --
that is the best hope for peace, for both our armies.
[tr. Fagles (1990), ll. 131-34]Always in fact do the spirits in younger men flutter unsteady;
but with an elder among them, at once the before and the after
he can observe, so that things will become far better for both sides.
[tr. Merrill (2007), ll. 108-110]
Rage is caused by a conviction, almost comic in its optimistic origins (however tragic in its effects), that a given frustration has not been written into the contract of life.
Alain de Botton (b. 1969) Swiss-British author
The Consolations of Philosophy, ch. 3 “Consolation for Frustration” (2000)
(Source)
DRUMLIN: I know you must think this is all very unfair. Maybe that’s an understatement. What you don’t know is I agree. I wish the world was a place where fair was the bottom line, where the kind of idealism you showed at the hearing was rewarded, not taken advantage of. Unfortunately, we don’t live in that world.
ARROWAY: Funny, I’ve always believed that the world is what we make of it.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
Contact, novel (1997) [film screenplay by J. Hart and M. Goldenberg]
(Source)
Dependability, integrity, the characteristic of never knowingly doing anything wrong, that you would never cheat anyone, that you would give everybody a fair deal. Character is a sort of an all-inclusive thing. If a man has character, everyone has confidence in him. Soldiers must have confidence in their leader.
Omar Bradley (1893-1981) American general
Interview with Edgar Puryear (1963-02-15)
(Source)
Quoted in Edgar Puryear, Nineteen Stars: A Study in Military Character and Leadership, ch. 6 (1971).
Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Column (1947-10-15), “My Day”
(Source)
On the US, hoping that "a just and workable plan would be evolved," officially declaring support on 11 October for the United Nations plan to partition Palestine into separate Arab and Jewish states.
SIMON: I’m trying to put this as delicately as I can. How do I know you won’t kill me in my sleep?
MAL: You don’t know me, son, so let me explain this to you once: If I ever kill you, you’ll be awake, you’ll be facing me, and you’ll be armed.
SIMON: Are you always this sentimental?
MAL: I had a good day.Joss Whedon (b. 1964) American screenwriter, author, producer [Joseph Hill Whedon]
Firefly, 1×01 “Serenity” (pilot) (20 Dec 2002)
We protest against unjust criticism, but we accept unearned applause.
José Narosky (b. 1930) Argentine aphorist and writer
Si Todos Los Sueños (1993)
Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled, but some people’s idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
Debate, House of Commons (13 Oct 1943)
(Source)
More discussion of this quotation: If Anyone Says Anything Back, That Is an Outrage – Quote Investigator.
Every man takes care that his neighbor shall not cheat him. But a day comes when he begins to care that he do not cheat his neighbor. Then all goes well. He has changed his market cart for a chariot of the sun.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Essay (1860), “Worship,” The Conduct of Life, ch. 6
(Source)
Based on a course of lectures, "The Conduct of Life," delivered in Pittsburg (1851-03).
From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death. For more than 20 years I have endeavored — indeed, I have struggled — along with a majority of this Court, to develop procedural and substantive rules that would lend more than the mere appearance of fairness to the death penalty endeavor. Rather than continue to coddle the Court’s delusion that the desired level of fairness has been achieved and the need for regulation eviscerated, I feel morally and intellectually obligated simply to concede that the death penalty experiment has failed. It is virtually self-evident to me now that no combination of procedural rules or substantive regulations ever can save the death penalty from its inherent constitutional deficiencies. The basic question — does the system accurately and consistently determine which defendants “deserve” to die? — cannot be answered in the affirmative. […] The problem is that the inevitability of factual, legal, and moral error gives us a system that we know must wrongly kill some defendants, a system that fails to deliver the fair, consistent, and reliable sentences of death required by the Constitution.
Harry Blackmun (1908-1999) US Supreme Court Associate Justice (1970-1994) [Harold Andrew Blackmun]
Callins v. Collins, 510 U.S. 1141 (1994) [dissent from denial of certiori]
(Source)
A fair & honest narrative of the bad is a voucher for the truth of the good.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter (1813-06-19) to Matthew Carey
(Source)
In the original, spelled "Mathew Carey"; in some sources, misidentified as "Matthew Carr."
Practical equality of opportunity for all citizens, when we achieve it, will have two great results. First, every man will have a fair chance to make of himself all that in him lies; to reach the highest point to which his capacities, unassisted by special privilege of his own and unhampered by the special privilege of others, can carry him, and to get for himself and his family substantially what he has earned. Second, equality of opportunity means that the commonwealth will get from every citizen the highest service of which he is capable. No man who carries the burden of the special privileges of another can give to the commonwealth that service to which it is fairly entitled.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
Speech (1910-08-31), “The New Nationalism,” John Brown Memorial Park dedication, Osawatomie, Kansas
(Source)
The qualities of a good prosecutor are as elusive and as impossible to define as those which mark a gentleman. And those who need to be told would not understand it anyway. A sensitiveness to fair play and sportsmanship is perhaps the best protection against the abuse of power, and the citizen’s safety lies in the prosecutor who tempers zeal with human kindness, who seeks truth and not victims, who serves the law and not factional purposes, and who approaches his task with humility.
Robert H. Jackson (1892-1954) US Supreme Court Justice (1941-54), lawyer, jurist, politician
“The Federal Prosecutor,” speech, Conference of United States Attorneys, Washington, DC (1940-04-01)
(Source)
Concluding words. Delivered while Jackson was the US Attorney General. Reprinted in the Journal of the American Judicature Society (1940-06).
Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
[Πάντα οὖν ὅσα ἐὰν θέλητε ἵνα ποιῶσιν ὑμῖν οἱ ἄνθρωποι, οὕτως καὶ ὑμεῖς ποιεῖτε αὐτοῖς· οὗτος γάρ ἐστιν ὁ νόμος καὶ οἱ προφῆται.]
The Bible (The New Testament) (AD 1st - 2nd C) Christian sacred scripture
Matthew 7: 12, “The Golden Rule” (Jesus) [KJV (1611)]
(Source)
Popularly, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
This passage is paralleled in Luke 6:31.
(Source (Greek)). Alternate translations:So always treat others as you would like them to treat you; that is the meaning of the Law and the Prophets.
[JB (1966)]So always treat others as you would like them to treat you; that is the Law and the Prophets.
[NJB (1985)]Do for others what you want them to do for you: this is the meaning of the Law of Moses and of the teachings of the prophets.
[GNT (1992 ed.)]Therefore, you should treat people in the same way that you want people to treat you; this is the Law and the Prophets.
[CEB (2011)]So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
[NIV (2011 ed.)]In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.
[NRSV (2021 ed.)]
Note: The "Golden Rule" has been expressed in many ways by many religious and philosophical teachers. Several of these in WIST are or will be cross-referenced to this particular quotation (as trackbacks, and through the golden rule topic tag), not to lend it sectarian primacy, but because this is the best-known formulation of it in the Western world.
Deal with the faults of others as gently as with your own.
Proverbs, Sayings, and Adages
Chinese proverb
CALVIN: It’s not fair!
CALVIN’S DAD: The world isn’t fair, Calvin.
CALVIN: I know, but why isn’t it ever unfair in my favor?
MARCUS: You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair; then I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happened to us come because we actually deserved them?’ So now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe.
J. Michael (Joe) Straczynski (b. 1954) American screenwriter, producer, author [a/k/a "JMS"]
Babylon 5, 3×13 “A Late Delivery from Avalon” (22 Apr 1996)
Let us treat men and women well; treat them as if they were real; perhaps they are.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“Experience,” Essays: Second Series (1844)
Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too.
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Dictionnaire philosophique portatif, “Tolerance” (1764)
We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like?
Jean Cocteau (1889-1963) French writer, filmmaker, artist
Comment (1955)
On his election to Académie Française. Alt. trans.: "Of course I believe in luck. How else does one explain the successes of one's enemies?"
