Quotes

Justice is that virtue of the soul which is distributive according to desert.

It is safer that a bad man should not be accused, than that he should be acquitted.

Pardon is the virtue of victory.

Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

On a planet that increasingly resembles one huge Maximum Security prison, the only intelligent choice is to plan a jail break.

It is the deed that teaches, not the name we give it. Murder and capital punishment are not opposites that cancel one another, but similars that breed their own kind.

I can work for the Lord in or out of prison.

The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.

Crime succeeds by sudden despatch; honest counsels gain vigor by delay.

One crime has to be concealed by another.

If we were brought to trial for the crimes we have committed against ourselves, few would escape the gallows.

When you are younger you get blamed for crimes you never committed and when you're older you begin to get credit for virtues you never possessed. It evens itself out.

Nor cell, nor chain, nor dungeon speaks to the murderer like the voice of solitude.

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.

Justice renders to every one his due.

To seek the redress of grievances by going to law, is like sheep running for shelter to a bramble bush.

Hanging was the worst use a man could be put to.

Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X came out of prison stronger.

Well does Heaven have care that no man secures happiness by crime.

If two people fight on the street, whose fault is it? Who is the criminal? It is the government’s responsibility because the government has not educated the people to not make mistakes. The people have inadequate, incompetent education, so they make mistakes! It is such a fraud.

Women have worked hard; starved in prison; given of their time and lives that we might sit in the House of Commons and take part in the legislating of this country.

To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit better than to commit ordinary murder.

In jail a man has no personality. He is a minor disposal problem and a few entries on reports. Nobody cares who loves or hates him, what he looks like, what he did with his life. Nobody reacts to him unless he gives trouble. Nobody abuses him. All that is asked of him is that he go quietly to the right cell and remain quiet when he gets there. There is nothing to fight against, nothing to be mad at. The jailers are quiet men without animosity or sadism.

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.

No written law has been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.