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?
I asked a man in prison once how he
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.
It is safer that a bad man should not be
It is safer that a bad man should not be accused, than that he should be acquitted.
Civilization is maintained by a very few
Civilization is maintained by a very few people in a small number of places and we need only some bombs and a few prisons to blot it out altogether.
We have initiated programs for re-entry
We have initiated programs for re-entry offenders, since some 500,000 to 600,000 offenders will come out of prison each year for the next three or four years. We want to have positive alternatives when they come back to the community.
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on those who impose them.
I can tell you this on a stack of
I can tell you this on a stack of Bibles: prisons are archaic, brutal, unregenerative, overcrowded hell holes where the inmates are treated like animals with absolutely not one humane thought given to what they are going to do once they are released. You're an animal in a cage and you're treated like one.
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is indeed defenseless!
Shyness is the prison of the heart.
Shyness is the prison of the heart.
Show me the prison, Show me the jail,
Show me the prison, Show me the jail, Show me the prisoner whose life has gone stale. And I'll show you a young man with so many reasons why And there, but for fortune, go you or I.
It becomes not a law-maker to be a
It becomes not a law-maker to be a law-breaker.
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.
Money will determine whether the accused
Money will determine whether the accused goes to prison or walks out of the courtroom a free man.
Definition, rationality, and structure
Definition, rationality, and structure are ways of seeing, but they become prisons when they blank out other ways of seeing.
In prison, you get the chance to see who
In prison, you get the chance to see who really loves you.
I was put into jail as I was going to
I was put into jail as I was going to the shoemaker's to get a shoe which was mended. When I was let out the next morning, I proceeded to finish my errand, and, having put on my mended shoe, joined a huckleberry party, who were impatient to put themselves under my conduct; and in half an hour -- for the horse was soon tackled -- was in the midst of a huckleberry field, on one of our highest hills, two miles off, and then the State was nowhere to be seen.
The virtue of justice consists in
The virtue of justice consists in moderation, as regulated by wisdom.
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.
Nothing can be more abhorrent to
Nothing can be more abhorrent to democracy than to imprison a person or keep him in prison because he is unpopular. This is really the test of civilization.
Trial by jury itself, instead of being a
Trial by jury itself, instead of being a security to persons who are accused, shall be a delusion, a mockery, and a snare.
While crime is punished it yet
While crime is punished it yet increases.
The only effect of public punishment is
The only effect of public punishment is to show the rabble how bravely it can be borne; and that every one who hath lost a toe-nail hath suffered worse.
The penalty for laughing in a courtroom
The penalty for laughing in a courtroom is six months in jail; if it were not for this penalty, the jury would never hear the evidence.
Some laws of state aimed at curbing
Some laws of state aimed at curbing crime are even more criminal.
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the
Virtue pardons the wicked, as the sandal-tree perfumes the axe which strikes it.
