For this reason, the law is established which no passion can disturb. It is void of desire and fear, lust and anger. It is mens sine affectu, written reason, retaining some measure of the divine perfection. It does not enjoin that which pleases a weak, frail man; but, without any regard to persons, commands that which is good, and punishes evil in all, whether rich or poor, high or low. It is deaf, inexorable, inflexible.
Algernon Sidney (1623-1683) English politician, republican political theorist [also Sydney]
Discourses Concerning Government, ch. 3, § 15 (1689)
(Source)
The Latin means "mind without emotion."
John Adams was a huge fan of Sidney (whose republican / anti-monarchical writings against King Charles II, leading to his execution, had significant impact on many of the Founders). Adams incorporated the above speech into the closing arguments of his legal defense of the British soldiers in the Boston Massacre trials (1770-12-04). Because of that use, Adams is often cited for the above quote, though he clearly attributed it to Sidney.
To the above, Adams added this, the last line of his closing:On the one hand it is inexorable to the cries and lamentations of the prisoners; on the other it is deaf, deaf as an adder to the clamours of the populace.
Quotations about:
legal system
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
Justice insists on obligation, law on decorum. Justice is critical and discriminating; law is supervisory and commanding. Justice refers to the individual, law to the community.
[Das Recht dringt auf Schuldigkeit, die Polizei aufs Geziemende. Das Recht ist abwägend und entscheidend, die Polizei überschauend und gebietend. Das Recht bezieht sich auf den Einzelnen, die Polizei auf die Gesamtheit.]
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) German poet, statesman, scientist
Sprüche in Prosa: Maximen und Reflexionen [Proverbs in Prose: Maxims and Reflections] (1833) [tr. Rönnfeldt (1900)]
(Source)
From Wilhelm Meister's Journeyman Years (1829).
(Source (German)). Alternate translations:Justice insists on obligation, law on decorum. Justice weighs and decides, law superintends and orders. Justice refers to the individual, law to society.
[tr. Saunders (1893), "Life and Character," sec. 1, # 50]Law deals with guilt, the police with what is fitting. Law considers and decides, the police surveys and commands. Law is concerned with the individual, the police with the community.
[tr. Stopp (1995), #544]
Don’t misinform your Doctor nor your Lawyer.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard (1737 ed.)
(Source)
JUSTICE, n. A commodity which in a more or less adulterated condition the State sells to the citizen as a reward for his allegiance, taxes, and personal service.
Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?) American writer and journalist
“Justice,” The Cynic’s Word Book (1906)
(Source)
Included in The Devil's Dictionary (1911). Originally published in the "Devil's Dictionary" column in the San Francisco Wasp (1886-01-09).
I have lived in one Reign, when the Prince, instead of invigorating the Laws of our Country, or giving them their proper Course, assumed a Power of dispensing with them: And in another, when the Sovereign was flattered by a Set of Men into a Persuasion, that the Regal Authority was unlimited and uncircumscribed. In either of these Cases, good Laws are at best but a dead Letter; and by shewing the People how happy they ought to be, only serve to aggravate the Sense of their Oppressions.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
Essay (1715-12-26), The Freeholder, No. 2
(Source)
A fine is a bribe paid by a rich man to escape the lawful penalty of his crime. In China such bribes are paid to the judge personally. In America they are paid to him as agent for the public. But it makes no difference to the men who pay them, nor to the men who can’t pay them.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
A Little Book in C Major, ch. 4, § 7 (1916)
(Source)
Variants:FINE. A bribe paid by a rich man to escape the lawful penalty of his crime. In China such bribes are paid to the judge personally; in America they are paid to him as agent for the public. But it makes no difference to the men who pay them -- nor to the men who can't pay them.
[A Book of Burlesques, "The Jazz Webster" (1924)]Fine -- A bribe paid by a rich man to escape the lawful penalty of his crime. In China such bribes are paid to the judge personally; in America they are paid to him as agent for the public. But it makes no difference to the men who pay them -- nor to the men who can’t pay them.
[Chrestomathy, ch. 30 "Sententiae" (1949)]
Society is only incidentally and in certain cases regulative, and law is no equivalent to the social order. […] Even in our civilization the law is never more than a crude implement of society, and one it is often enough necessary to check in its arrogant career. It is never to be read off as if it were the equivalent of the social order.
Ruth Benedict (1887-1947) American anthropologist
Patterns of Culture, ch. 8 “The Individual and Culture” (1934)
(Source)
Despite what Hollywood would lead you to believe, we criminal defense attorneys do not advocate lenient sentences for all wrongdoers as a matter of policy. […] Our role is to stand beside our clients, no matter who they are or what they did, and be their advocates, the one person required to plead their case and argue their interests. This is the closest our society comes to grace or humility. It’s grace because we give this support to defendants whether they deserve it by any objective measure, and it’s humility because we know the system is so capable of grave error in accusing and punishing.
Ken White (b. c. 1969) American constitutional and criminal attorney, prosecutor, blogger
“Fault Lines” blog, Mimeslaw.com (8 Jun 2016)
(Source)
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.
[Lorsque la Spoliation est devenue le moyen d’existence d’une agglomération d’hommes unis entre eux par le lien social, ils se font bientôt une loi qui la sanctionne, une morale qui la glorifie.]
Frédéric Bastiat (1801-1850) French philosopher, economist, politician
Economic Sophisms [Sophismes économiques], 2nd Series, ch. 1 “Physiology of plunder Physiologie de la spoliation” (1848)
(Source)
Alt. trans. "When Spoliation has become the means of existence of an agglomeration of men united by social bonds, they soon make themselves a law which sanctions it, a morality which glorifies it."
No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed, or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, no will we send against him except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Magna Carta, Clause 39 (1215)
Nothing could be more grotesquely unjust than a code of morals, reinforced by laws, which relieves men from responsibility for irregular sexual acts, and for the same acts drives women to abortion, infanticide, prostitution, and self-destruction.
Suzanne La Follette (1893-1983) American journalist, author, feminist
Concerning Women (1926)
(Source)
But there is one way in this country in which all men are created equal — there is one human institution that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller, the stupid man the equal of an Einstein, and the ignorant man the equal of any college president. That institution, gentlemen, is a court. It can be in the Supreme Court of the United States or the humblest J.P. court in the land, or this honorable court which you serve. Our courts have their faults, as does any human institution, but in this country our courts are the great levelers, and in our courts all men are created equal.
Harper Lee (1926-2016) American writer [Nellie Harper Lee]
To Kill a Mockingbird, ch. 20 (1960)
The law, in all vicissitudes of government, fluctuations of the passions, or flights of enthusiasm, will preserve a steady undeviating course; it will not bend to the uncertain wishes, imaginations, and wanton tempers of men. […] On the one hand it is inexorable to the cries and lamentations of the prisoners; on the other it is deaf, deaf as an adder to the clamours of the populace.
John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
Speech (1770-12-04), “Argument in Defence of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials”
(Source)
At the ellipses, Adams included Algernon Sidney's comments on the steady, dispassionate strength of the law.
The precepts of the law are these: to live honestly, to injure no one, and to give everyone his due.
Justinian I (c. 482-565) Byzantine emperor [Justinian the Great]
Code of Justinian (533)
Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasion for it.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian politician, philosopher, political scientist
The Discourses on Livy, Book 1, Introduction (1517) [tr. Detmold (1882)]
Alt. trans.: "It is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope." [Discourse upon the First Ten Books of Livy, Book 1, ch. 3 (1513-18) [tr. Gilbert]]
Unjust laws exist: shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) American philosopher and writer
Essay (1849-05), “Resistance to Civil Government [On the Duty of Civil Disobedience],” Æsthetic Papers, No. 1, Article 10
(Source)
Based on an 1848 lecture at the Concord Lyceum.
You ask, What makes it worth defending? and the only answer I can give is this: Freedom to write, freedom to read, freedom to own material that you believe is worth defending means you’re going to have to stand up for stuff you don’t believe is worth defending, even stuff you find actively distasteful, because laws are big blunt instruments that do not differentiate between what you like and what you don’t, because prosecutors are humans and bear grudges and fight for re-election, because one person’s obscenity is another person’s art. Because if you don’t stand up for the stuff you don’t like, when they come for the stuff you do like, you’ve already lost.
Neil Gaiman (b. 1960) British author, screenwriter, fabulist
Blog entry (2008-12-01), “Why defend freedom of icky speech?”
(Source)
ROPER: So, now you’d give the Devil the benefit of law!
MORE: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
ROPER: Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!
MORE: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you — where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast — Man’s laws, not God’s — and if you cut them down — and you’re just the man to do it — d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.
Robert Bolt (1924-1995) English dramatist
A Man for All Seasons, play, Act 1 (1960)
(Source)
Bolt's 1966 film adaptation uses the same language, with slightly variant punctuation. As well, the film ends the scene here, where the play continues with further dialog.
