Pardon is the virtue of victory.
A just chastisement may benefit a man, though it seldom does; but an unjust one changes all his blood to gall.
On average, drug prisoners spend more time in federal prison than rapists, who often get out on early release because of the overcrowding in prison caused by the Drug War.
What is crime amongst the multitude, is only vice among the few.
Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.
Most people fancy themselves innocent of those crimes of which they cannot be convicted.
Liberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude.
I sometimes wish that people would put a little more emphasis upon the observance of the law than they do upon its enforcement.
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.
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.
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.”
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.
I asked a man in prison once how he happened to be there and he said he had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him if he had stolen a railroad he would be a United States Senator.
The thoughts of a prisoner - they're not free either. They keep returning to the same things.
Everyone is a prisoner of his own experiences. No one can eliminate prejudices - just recognize them.
You stuff somebody into the American dream, and it becomes a prison.
It is certain that the study of human psychology, if it were undertaken exclusively in prisons, would also lead to misrepresentation and absurd generalizations.
I have never been contained except I made the prison.
The most anxious man in a prison is the governor.
Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a God.
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.
We're in a war. People who blast some pot on a casual basis are guilty of treason.
To make punishments efficacious, two things are necessary. They must never be disproportioned to the offence, and they must be certain.
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.
