It was only when I lay there on the rotting prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good. Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not between states nor between social classes nor between political parties, but right through every human heart, through all human hearts. And that is why I turn back to the years of my imprisonment and say, sometimes to the astonishment of those about me, bless you, prison, for having been a part of my life.
The difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion is the thickness of a prison walls.
Shyness is the prison of the heart.
The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.
He was a first-time nonviolent possible offender, ... And under the mandatory minimums, he was put in prison for 15 years. Not only does the punishment not fit the crime, but the mandatory minimums don't give judges any discretion to look at the background of the case, to read into the specifics of the case. I don't know a judge who really is in favor of the mandatory minimums.
To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit better than to commit ordinary murder.
The best situation of all, and one frequently utilized, is for jails and prisons to allow volunteer ministers of all faiths to enter prisons and offer their services to the inmates who want them. That way, the religious needs of inmates are met but without government funds being spent.
If we were brought to trial for the crimes we have committed against ourselves, few would escape the gallows.
A sick person is a prisoner.
Well, I don't think prisons are the answer to everything, obviously.
I just remember that disturbing feeling of walking into that prison, the complete loss of privacy, the complete loss of stimulation, dignity.
Prison, dungeons, blessed places where evil is impossible because they are the crossroads of all the evil in the world. One cannot commit evil in hell.
The guilt of enforced crimes lies on those who impose them.
Some laws of state aimed at curbing crime are even more criminal.
The world itself is but a large prison, out of which some are daily led to execution.
Fear can be like a prison. It is, however, a self made prison. Many are imprisoned by fear. No one else can liberate them from this prison. Others may inspire them but they must liberate themselves.
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.
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.”
No obligation to justice does force a man to be cruel, or to use the sharpest sentence.
The virtue of justice consists in moderation, as regulated by wisdom.
Once we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our mind, our duty is to furnish it well.
The uneven impact of actual enforcement measures tends to mirror and reinforce more general patterns of discrimination (along socioeconomic, racial and ethnic, sexual, and perhaps generational lines) within the society. As a consequence, such enforcement (ineffective as it may be in producing conformity) almost certainly reinforces feelings of alienation already prevalent within major segments of the population.
Do not lay on the multitude the blame that is due to a few.
Wicked deeds are generally done, even with impunity, for the mere desire of occupation.
