Man is condemned to be free.
Man is condemned to be free.
The thoughts of a prisoner - they're not
The thoughts of a prisoner - they're not free either. They keep returning to the same things.
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.
It becomes not a law-maker to be a
It becomes not a law-maker to be a law-breaker.
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the sandal-tree perfumes the axe which strikes it.
One crime is everything; two nothing.
One crime is everything; two nothing.
A variety in punishment is of utility,
A variety in punishment is of utility, as well as a proportion.
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.
The object of punishment is prevention
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
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 written law has been more binding
No written law has been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.
I asked a man in prison once how he
I asked a man in prison once how he happened to be there and he said he had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him if he had stolen a railroad he would be a United States Senator.
If you strike at, imprison, or kill us,
If you strike at, imprison, or kill us, out of our prisons or graves we will still evoke a spirit that will thwart you, and perhaps, raise a force that will destroy you! We defy you! Do your worst!
I just remember that disturbing feeling
I just remember that disturbing feeling of walking into that prison, the complete loss of privacy, the complete loss of stimulation, dignity.
Let us remember that justice must be
Let us remember that justice must be observed even to the lowest.
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.
Society prepares the crime; the criminal
Society prepares the crime; the criminal commits it.
If you share the crime of your friend,
If you share the crime of your friend, you make it your own.
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.
I sometimes wish that people would put a
I sometimes wish that people would put a little more emphasis upon the observance of the law than they do upon its enforcement.
It is better that ten guilty persons
It is better that ten guilty persons escape, than that one innocent suffer.
Do not lay on the multitude the blame
Do not lay on the multitude the blame that is due to a few.
Hard cases, it is said, make bad law.
Hard cases, it is said, make bad law.
The uneven impact of actual enforcement
The uneven impact of actual enforcement measures tends to mirror and reinforce more general patterns of discrimination (along socioeconomic, racial and ethnic, sexual, and perhaps generational lines) within the society. As a consequence, such enforcement (ineffective as it may be in producing conformity) almost certainly reinforces feelings of alienation already prevalent within major segments of the population.
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.
