Crime succeeds by sudden despatch; honest counsels gain vigor by delay.
When it comes to freedom, we are but prisoners of our own desires.
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
It is better that ten guilty persons escape, than that one innocent suffer.
While we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells.
One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.
If punishment reaches not the mind and makes not the will supple, it hardens the offender.
Crimes lead one into another; they who are capable of being forgers are capable of being incendiaries.
Intellectual despair results in neither weakness nor dreams, but in violence. It is only a matter of knowing how to give vent to one's rage; whether one only wants to wander like madmen around prisons, or whether one wants to overturn them.
I just remember that disturbing feeling of walking into that prison, the complete loss of privacy, the complete loss of stimulation, dignity.
I have paid no poll-tax for six years. I was put into a jail once on this account, for one night; and, as I stood considering the walls of solid stone, I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated me as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up...I saw that, if there was a wall of stone between me and my townsmen, there was a still more difficult one to climb or break through, before they could get to be as free as I was.
The most anxious man in a prison is the governor.
Some laws of state aimed at curbing crime are even more criminal.
There is no greater punishment of wickedness that that it is dissatisfied with itself and its deeds.
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.
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
We don't seem to be able to check crime, so why not legalize it and then tax it out of business.
The public have more interest in the punishment of an injury than he who receives it.
You utter a vow, or forge a signature, and you may find yourself bound for life to a monastery, a woman, or prison.
If you treat prisoners well, they will be less angry, less inclined to violence inside prison, less likely to provoke violent actions by guards, less likely to have reason to file brutality lawsuits that cost taxpayers a bundle and waste administrators' time. And most important, well-treated prisoners will be less likely to leave prison angrier, more vicious and more inclined to criminal behavior than when they went in.
Every crime has, in the moment of its perpetration, Its own avenging angel--dark misgiving, An ominous sinking at the inmost heart.
Pardon is the virtue of victory.
Prosecution I have managed to avoid; but I have been arrested, charged in a police court, have refused to be bound over, and thereupon have been unconditionally released - to my great regret; for I have always wanted to know what going to prison was like.
Whatever is worthy to be loved for anything is worthy of preservation. A wise and dispassionate legislator, if any such should ever arise among men, will not condemn to death him who has done or is likely to do more service than injury to society. Blocks and gibbets are the nearest objects with legislators, and their business is never with hopes or with virtues.
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on those who impose them.
