The power of punishment is to silence, not to confute.
What restrains us from killing is partly fear of punishment, partly moral scruple, and partly what may be described as a sense of humor.
Forgiveness, that noblest of all self-denial, is a virtue which he alone who can practise in himself can willingly believe in another.
We don't seem to be able to check crime, so why not legalize it and then tax it out of business.
Three hundred years ago a prisoner condemned to the Tower of London carved on the wall of his cell this sentiment to keep up his spirits during his long imprisonment: “It is not adversity that kills, but the impatience with which we bear adversity.”
It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.
Trial by jury itself, instead of being a security to persons who are accused, shall be a delusion, a mockery, and a snare.
One crime has to be concealed by another.
The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.
Most people fancy themselves innocent of those crimes of which they cannot be convicted.
Definition, rationality, and structure are ways of seeing, but they become prisons when they blank out other ways of seeing.
I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.
The difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion is the thickness of a prison walls.
Fast closed with double grills And triple gates–the cell To wicked souls is hell; But to a mind that's innocent 'Tis only iron, wood and stone.
A sick person is a prisoner.
Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work, or prison.
If punishment reaches not the mind and makes not the will supple, it hardens the offender.
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.
It is hard, but it is excellent, to find the right knowledge of when correction is necessary and when grace doth most avail.
Crime is a logical extension of the sort of behavior that often [is] considered perfectly respectable in legitimate business.
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.
We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.
We shall not yield to violence. We shall not be deprived of union freedoms. We shall never agree with sending people to prison for their convictions.
When the Nazis came for the communists, I remained silent; I was not a communist. When they locked up the social democrats, I remained silent; I was not a social democrat. When they came for the trade unionists, I did not speak out; I was not a trade unionist. When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.
