The object of punishment is prevention
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
Society has used the juvenile courts to
Society has used the juvenile courts to create a caste system where there are throw-away people.
It is the spirit and not the form of law
It is the spirit and not the form of law that keeps justice alive.
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law.
I have never been contained except I
I have never been contained except I made the prison.
So justice while she winks at crimes,
So justice while she winks at crimes, Stumbles on innocence sometimes.
Educate your children to self-control,
Educate your children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future lives and crimes to society.
Do not lay on the multitude the blame
Do not lay on the multitude the blame that is due to a few.
They took away my money, my family, and
They took away my money, my family, and my security. Why couldn't they destroy my ideas? We will question them in court tomorrow as we trigger The Revolution of all revolutions!
Laws do not persuade just because they
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten.
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.
Trial by jury itself, instead of being a
Trial by jury itself, instead of being a security to persons who are accused, shall be a delusion, a mockery, and a snare.
Society prepares the crime; the criminal
Society prepares the crime; the criminal commits it.
When is conduct a crime, and when is a
When is conduct a crime, and when is a crime not a crime? When Somebody Up There -- a monarch, a dictator, a Pope, a legislator -- so decrees.
Faults of the head are punished in this
Faults of the head are punished in this world, those of the heart in another; but as most of our vices are compound, so also is their punishment.
We who live in prison, and in whose
We who live in prison, and in whose lives there is no event but sorrow, have to measure time by throbs of pain, and the record of bitter moments.
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.
I am an expert of electricity. My father
I am an expert of electricity. My father occupied the chair of applied electricity at the state prison.
Man is born free, and everywhere he is
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
Any punishment that does not correct,
Any punishment that does not correct, that can merely rouse rebellion in whoever has to endure it, is a piece of gratuitous infamy which makes those who impose it more guilty in the eyes of humanity, good sense and reason, nay a hundred times more guilty than the victim on whom the punishment is inflicted.
Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X came out of
Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X came out of prison stronger.
Vices are not crimes.
Vices are not crimes.
To trial bring her stolen charms, and
To trial bring her stolen charms, and let her prison be my arms.
There are dreadful punishments enacted
There are dreadful punishments enacted against thieves; but it were much better to make such good provisions, by which every man might be put in a method how to live, and so to be preserved from the fatal necessity of stealing and dying for it.
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.
