It isn't true that convicts live like
It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.
I have never been contained except I
I have never been contained except I made the prison.
When it comes to freedom, we are but
When it comes to freedom, we are but prisoners of our own desires.
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.
Care should be taken that the punishment
Care should be taken that the punishment does not exceed the guilt; and also that some men do not suffer for offenses for which others are not even indicted.
I never told a victim story about my
I never told a victim story about my imprisonment. Instead, I told a transformation story - about how prison changed my outlook, about how I saw that communication, truth, and trust are at the heart of power.
Reality becomes a prison to those who
Reality becomes a prison to those who can’t get out of it.
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 contagion of crime is like that of
The contagion of crime is like that of the plague. Criminals collected together corrupt each other; they are worse than ever when at the termination of their punishment they re-enter society.
Why would anyone expect him to come out
Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter? He went to prison for three years, not Princeton.
If it's near dinner-time, the foreman
If it's near dinner-time, the foreman takes out his watch when the jury has retired, and says: "Dear me, gentlemen, ten minutes to five, I declare! I dine at five, gentlemen." "So do I," says everybody else, except two men who ought to have dined at three and seem more than half disposed to stand out in consequence. The foreman smiles, and puts up his watch:--"Well, gentlemen, what do we say, plaintiff or defendant, gentlemen?
One man meets an infamous punishment for
One man meets an infamous punishment for that crime which confers a diadem upon another.
I submit that an individual who breaks a
I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.
The power of punishment is to silence,
The power of punishment is to silence, not to confute.
The law does not pretend to punish
The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business.
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.
The difference between tax avoidance and
The difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion is the thickness of a prison walls.
What is crime amongst the multitude, is
What is crime amongst the multitude, is only vice among the few.
Whatever you think of de Sade, he was a
Whatever you think of de Sade, he was a complex figure and we should not look for easy answers with him. He was, strangely perhaps, against the death penalty, and he was never put in prison for murders or anything like that.
The object of punishment is prevention
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
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.
Taught from infancy that beauty is
Taught from infancy that beauty is woman's sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison.
It becomes not a law-maker to be a
It becomes not a law-maker to be a law-breaker.
Money will determine whether the accused
Money will determine whether the accused goes to prison or walks out of the courtroom a free man.
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.
