Every instance of a man's suffering the
Every instance of a man's suffering the penalty of the law is an instance of the failure of that penalty in effecting its purpose, which is to deter.
Pardon is the virtue of victory.
Pardon is the virtue of victory.
Laws do not persuade just because they
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.
A Sunday school is a prison in which
A Sunday school is a prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents.
A country is in a bad state, which is
A country is in a bad state, which is governed only by laws; because a thousand things occur for which laws cannot provide, and where authority ought to interpose.
No matter how you seem to fatten on a
No matter how you seem to fatten on a crime, that can never be good for the bee which is bad for the hive.
It is the spirit and not the form of law
It is the spirit and not the form of law that keeps justice alive.
Extreme justice is extreme injustice.
Extreme justice is extreme injustice.
One of the problems that the marijuana
One of the problems that the marijuana reform movement consistently faces is that everyone wants to talk about what marijuana does, but no one ever wants to look at what marijuana prohibition does. Marijuana never kicks down your door in the middle of the night. Marijuana never locks up sick and dying people, does not suppress medical research, does not peek in bedroom windows. Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could.
I never saw a man who looked With such a
I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky.
If we were brought to trial for the
If we were brought to trial for the crimes we have committed against ourselves, few would escape the gallows.
We have initiated programs for re-entry
We have initiated programs for re-entry offenders, since some 500,000 to 600,000 offenders will come out of prison each year for the next three or four years. We want to have positive alternatives when they come back to the community.
The reformative effect of punishment is
The reformative effect of punishment is a belief that dies hard, chiefly I think, because it is so satisfying to our sadistic impulses.
Liberty is rendered even more precious
Liberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude.
Civilization is maintained by a very few
Civilization is maintained by a very few people in a small number of places and we need only some bombs and a few prisons to blot it out altogether.
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on those who impose them.
They're not supposed to show prison
They're not supposed to show prison films in prison. Especially ones that are about escaping.
I know how men in exile feed on dreams
I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.
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.
Since 1957, black people have
Since 1957, black people have experienced double-digit unemployment - in good times and bad times. Look at the population of African Americans in prison. They represent more than half the population of prisoners in the country, 55 percent of those on death row.
Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X came out of
Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X came out of prison stronger.
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.
The degree of civilization in a society
The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.
