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“Justice, I think, is the tolerable accomodation of the conflicting interests of society, and I don't believe there is any royal road to attain such accomodations concretely.”

Learned Hand

From The Great Judge by Philip Hamburger (1946).
Extra-judicial writings

“What to an outsider will be no more than the vigorous presentation of a conviction, to an employee may be the manifestation of a determination which it is not safe to thwart.”

Learned Hand

National Labor Relations Board v. Federbush Co., 121 F.2d 954, 957 (1941).
Judicial opinions

“I had rather take my chance that some traitors will escape detection than spread abroad a spirit of general suspicion and distrust, which accepts rumor and gossip in place of undismayed and unintimidated inquiry.”

Learned Hand

Extra-judicial writings, Speech to the Board of Regents (1952)

“Any one may so arrange his affairs that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which will best pay the Treasury; there is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes.”

Learned Hand

Helvering v. Gregory http://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/69/809/1562063/, 69 F.2d 809, 810-11 (2d Cir. 1934). <br class="br">Judicial opinions

“A self-made man may prefer a self-made name.”

Learned Hand

Granting court permission for Samuel Goldfish to change his name to Samuel Goldwyn, as quoted in Lion's Share by Bosley Crowther (1957).
Extra-judicial writings

“It is often hard to secure unanimity about the borders of legislative power, but that is much easier than to decide how far a particular adjustment diverges from what the judges deem tolerable. On such issues experience has over and over again shown the difficulty of securing unanimity. This is disastrous because disunity cancels the impact of monolithic solidarity on which the authority of a bench of judges so largely depends.”

Learned Hand

The Bill Of Rights (1958), p. 72.
Extra-judicial writings

“A wise man once said, "Convention is like the shell to the chick, a protection till he is strong enough to break it through."”

Learned Hand

"The Preservation of Personality" commencement address at Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania (2 June 1927); also in The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses (1952), p. 32.
Extra-judicial writings

“Yet the whole structure of the common law is an obvious denial of this theory; it stands as a monument slowly raised, like a coral reef, from the minute accretions of past individuals, of whom each built upon the relics which his predecessors left, and in his turn left a foundation upon which his successors might work.”

Learned Hand

Book Review, 35 Harv. L. Rev. 479, 479 (1922) (reviewing Benjamin N. Cardozo's The Nature of the Judicial Process).
Extra-judicial writings

“That community is already in the process of dissolution where each man begins to eye his neighbor as a possible enemy, where nonconformity with the accepted creed, political as well as religious, is a mark of disaffection; where denunciation, without specification or backing, takes the place of evidence; where orthodoxy chokes freedom of dissent; where faith in the eventual supremacy of reason has become so timid that we dare not enter our convictions in the open lists, to win or lose.”

Learned Hand

Extra-judicial writings, Speech to the Board of Regents (1952)

“The mid-day sun is too much for most eyes; one is dazzled even with its reflection. Be careful that too broad and high an aim does not paralyze your effort and clog your springs of action.”

Learned Hand

The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses (1952), p. 9.
Extra-judicial writings

“Heretics have been hated from the beginning of recorded time; they have been ostracized, exiled, tortured, maimed, and butchered; but it has generally proved impossible to smother them; and when it has not, the society that has succeeded has always declined.”

Learned Hand

"A Fanfare for Prometheus" (29 January 1955); also in The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses (1952), p. 131.
Extra-judicial writings

“Right knows no boundaries and justice no frontiers; the brotherhood of man is not a domestic institution.”

Learned Hand

"A Pledge of Allegiance" - speech for "I Am an American Day" in Central Park, New York, New York. (20 May 1945).
Extra-judicial writings

“No doubt one may quote history to support any cause, as the devil quotes scripture; but modern history is not a very satisfactory side-arm in political polemics; it grows less and less so.”

Learned Hand

"Sources of Tolerance" (1930); also in The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses (1952), p. 79.
Extra-judicial writings

“I shall ask no more than that you agree with Dean Inge that even though counting heads is not an ideal way to govern, at least it is better than breaking them.”

Learned Hand

"Democracy: Its Presumptions and Realities" (1932); also in The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses (1952), p. 92.
Extra-judicial writings

“The mutual confidence on which all else depends can be maintained only by an open mind and a brave reliance upon free discussion.”

Learned Hand

Extra-judicial writings, Speech to the Board of Regents (1952)

“Life is made up of a series of judgments on insufficient data, and if we waited to run down all our doubts, it would flow past us.”

Learned Hand

"On Receiving an Honorary Degree" (1939).
Extra-judicial writings

“[W]hat seems fair enough against a squalid huckster of bad liquor may take on a different face, if used by a government determined to suppress political opposition under the guise of sedition.”

Learned Hand

U.S. v. Kirschenblatt, 16 F.2d 202, 203 (2d Cir. 1926).
Judicial opinions

“You may ask what then will become of the fundamental principles of equity and fair play which our constitutions enshrine; and whether I seriously believe that unsupported they will serve merely as counsels of moderation. I do not think that anyone can say what will be left of those principles; I do not know whether they will serve only as counsels; but this much I think I do know — that a society so riven that the spirit of moderation is gone, no court can save; that a society where that spirit flourishes, no court need save; that in a society which evades its responsibility by thrusting upon the courts the nurture of that spirit, that spirit in the end will perish.”

Learned Hand

"The Contribution of an Independent Judiciary to Civilization" (1942).
Extra-judicial writings

“"I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that ye may be mistaken." I should like to have that written over the portals of every church, every school, and every courthouse, and, may I say, of every legislative body in the United States. I should like to have every court begin, "I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that we may be mistaken."”

Learned Hand

Morals in Public Life (1951); Hand is here paraphrasing a famous expression of Oliver Cromwell from his letter of 3 August 1650 to the general assembly of the Church of Scotland.
Extra-judicial writings

“This is the most miserable of cases, but we must dispose of it as though it had been presented by actual lawyers.”

Learned Hand

As quoted in Learned Hand : The Man and the Judge (1994) by Gerald Gunther.
Extra-judicial writings