America is the land of the second chance
America is the land of the second chance – and when the gates of the prison open, the path ahead should lead to a better life.
You utter a vow, or forge a signature,
You utter a vow, or forge a signature, and you may find yourself bound for life to a monastery, a woman, or prison.
Federal prison, if you get any of it,
Federal prison, if you get any of it, you're going to have to do 85% of it. And the reason why I called it that is because I had a friend who got sent to the federal joint and his whole... it wasn't about him being in jail. He cried about the 85%.
The only real prison is fear, and the
The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.
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.
Intellectual despair results in neither
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.
A just chastisement may benefit a man,
A just chastisement may benefit a man, though it seldom does; but an unjust one changes all his blood to gall.
He who opens a school door, closes a
He who opens a school door, closes a prison.
The severest justice may not always be
The severest justice may not always be the best policy.
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on those who impose them.
No obligation to justice does force a
No obligation to justice does force a man to be cruel, or to use the sharpest sentence.
Faults of the head are punished in this
Faults of the head are punished in this world, those of the heart in another; but as most of our vices are compound, so also is their punishment.
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the sandal-tree perfumes the axe which strikes it.
Whatever is worthy to be loved for
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 worst prison is not of stone. It is
The worst prison is not of stone. It is of a throbbing heart, outraged by an infamous life.
No matter how you seem to fatten on a
No matter how you seem to fatten on a crime, that can never be good for the bee which is bad for the hive.
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.
Prison continues, on those who are
Prison continues, on those who are entrusted to it, a work begun elsewhere, which the whole of society pursues on each individual through innumerable mechanisms of discipline.
Vices are not crimes.
Vices are not crimes.
If we look at Houston, which is a very
If we look at Houston, which is a very environmentally toxic place, we find that it has one of the highest levels of young men going to prison and also among the highest levels of illiteracy in the country.
The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off
The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.
Prison makes you a better judge of
Prison makes you a better judge of character. You pick up on people much faster.
Prisons don't rehabilitate, they don't
Prisons don't rehabilitate, they don't punish, they don't protect, so what the hell do they do?
The common argument that crime is caused
The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.
Punishment, that is the justice for the
Punishment, that is the justice for the unjust.
