The only difference between me and my
The only difference between me and my fellow actors is that I've spent more time in jail.
The most anxious man in a prison is the
The most anxious man in a prison is the governor.
He was a first-time nonviolent possible
He was a first-time nonviolent possible offender, ... And under the mandatory minimums, he was put in prison for 15 years. Not only does the punishment not fit the crime, but the mandatory minimums don't give judges any discretion to look at the background of the case, to read into the specifics of the case. I don't know a judge who really is in favor of the mandatory minimums.
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is indeed defenseless!
It is not at the table, but in prison,
It is not at the table, but in prison, that you learn who your true friends are.
Law is merely the expression of the will
Law is merely the expression of the will of the strongest for the time being, and therefore laws have no fixity, but shift from generation to generation.
A sick person is a prisoner.
A sick person is a prisoner.
Experts and the educated elite have
Experts and the educated elite have replaced what worked with what sounded good. Society was far more civilized before they took over our schools, prisons, welfare programs, police departments and courts. It's high time we ran these people out of our lives and went back to common sense.
Distrust all in whom the impulse to
Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.
A variety in punishment is of utility,
A variety in punishment is of utility, as well as a proportion.
Mere factual innocence is no reason not
Mere factual innocence is no reason not to carry out a death sentence properly reached.
If you want total security, go to
If you want total security, go to prison. There you’re fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking…is freedom.
He had drawn many a thousand of these
He had drawn many a thousand of these rations in prisons and camps, and though he'd never had an opportunity to weight them on scales, and although, being a man of timid nature, he knew no way of standing up for his rights, he, like every other prisoner, had discovered long ago that honest weight was never to be found in the bread-cutting. There was short weight in every ration. The only point was how short. So every day you took a look to soothe your soul - today, maybe, they haven't snitched any.
When the Nazis came for the communists,
When the Nazis came for the communists, I remained silent; I was not a communist. When they locked up the social democrats, I remained silent; I was not a social democrat. When they came for the trade unionists, I did not speak out; I was not a trade unionist. When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.
To be at peace in crime! Ah, who can
To be at peace in crime! Ah, who can thus flatter himself.
Written laws are like spiders' webs, and
Written laws are like spiders' webs, and will, like them, only entangle and hold the poor and weak, while the rich and powerful will easily break through them.
Assassination is the extreme form of
Assassination is the extreme form of censorship.
In prison, you get the chance to see who
In prison, you get the chance to see who really loves you.
To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit
To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit better than to commit ordinary murder.
Pardon is the virtue of victory.
Pardon is the virtue of victory.
Intellectual despair results in neither
Intellectual despair results in neither weakness nor dreams, but in violence. It is only a matter of knowing how to give vent to one's rage; whether one only wants to wander like madmen around prisons, or whether one wants to overturn them.
One crime has to be concealed by
One crime has to be concealed by another.
Two men look out the same prison bars;
Two men look out the same prison bars; one sees mud and the other stars.
Crime succeeds by sudden despatch;
Crime succeeds by sudden despatch; honest counsels gain vigor by delay.
Before we can diminish our sufferings
Before we can diminish our sufferings from the ill-controlled aggressive assaults of fellow citizens, we must renounce the philosophy of punishment, the obsolete, vengeful penal attitude. In its place we would seek a comprehensive, constructive social attitude - therapeutic in some instances, restraining in some instances, but preventive in its total social impact. In the last analysis this becomes a question of personal morals and values. No matter how glorified or how piously disguised, vengeance as a human motive must be personally repudiated by each and every one of us.
