Society prepares the crime; the criminal commits it.
When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.
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.
I was put into jail as I was going to the shoemaker's to get a shoe which was mended. When I was let out the next morning, I proceeded to finish my errand, and, having put on my mended shoe, joined a huckleberry party, who were impatient to put themselves under my conduct; and in half an hour -- for the horse was soon tackled -- was in the midst of a huckleberry field, on one of our highest hills, two miles off, and then the State was nowhere to be seen.
Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter? He went to prison for three years, not Princeton.
Here the great art lies, to discern in what the law is to be to restraint and punishment, and in what things persuasion only is to work.
One of the many lessons that one learns in prison is, that things are what they are and will be what they will be.
There are few better measures of the concern a society has for its individual members and its own well being than the way it handles criminals.
Organized crime in America takes in over forty billion dollars a year. This is quite a profitable sum, especially when one considers that the Mafia spends very little for office supplies.
In a civilized society, all crimes are likely to be sins, but most sins are not and ought not to be treated as crimes.
The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.
In jail a man has no personality. He is a minor disposal problem and a few entries on reports. Nobody cares who loves or hates him, what he looks like, what he did with his life. Nobody reacts to him unless he gives trouble. Nobody abuses him. All that is asked of him is that he go quietly to the right cell and remain quiet when he gets there. There is nothing to fight against, nothing to be mad at. The jailers are quiet men without animosity or sadism.
When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.
We have our own system, ... and journalists in our system are not put in prison for embarrassing the government by revealing things the government might not wish to have revealed. The important thing is that our system, under which journalists can write without fear or favor, should continue.
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
The refined punishments of the spiritual mode are usually much more indecent and dangerous than a good smack.
The English laws punish vice; the Chinese laws do more, they reward virtue.
Shyness is the prison of the heart.
Body is a home, a prison and a grave.
No crime has been without a precedent.
Prisons don't rehabilitate, they don't punish, they don't protect, so what the hell do they do?
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass, Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron, Can be retentive to the strength of spirit; But life, being weary of these worldly bars, Never lacks power to dismiss itself.
Let us remember that justice must be observed even to the lowest.
If two people fight on the street, whose fault is it? Who is the criminal? It is the government’s responsibility because the government has not educated the people to not make mistakes. The people have inadequate, incompetent education, so they make mistakes! It is such a fraud.
