A collection of quotes on the topic of justice, people, doing, law.
“Justice is to be found only in the imagination.”
“Mercy is of greater value than justice.”
La clémence vaut mieux que la justice.
Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 174.
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
1960s, The Rising Tide of Racial Consciousnes (1960)
Context: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Therefore, no American can afford to be apathetic about the problem of racial justice. It is a problem that meets every man at his front door.
“The voice of the majority is no proof of justice.”
As quoted in A Dictionary of Thoughts : Being a Cyclopedia of Laconic Quotations from the Best Authors, Both Ancient and Modern (1891) edited by Tryon Edwards. p. 324
“Laws of justice which Hammurabi, the wise king, established.”
Epilogue to the Code of Hammurabi (translated by Leonard William King, 1910). i like potatoes
“There is no freedom without justice.”
Although this maxim is associated with Wiesenthal (e.g. "Honoring Simon Wiesenthal", Congressional Record—House, Vol. 151, Pt. 15, 21 September 2005, p. 20804), he did not originate the quote, which appears in the context of the labor movement in the 19th century (e.g. Alexander Spencer, "Maintain Your Union", The Typographical Journal, Vol. 10, No. 7, 1 April 1897, p. 266).
Misattributed
“Oh, Elizabeth, your justice would freeze beer.”
Source: The Crucible (1953)
Context: Proctor: You will not judge me more, Elizabeth. I have good reason to think before I charge fraud on Abigail, and I will think on it. Let you look to your own improvement before you go to judge your husband any more. I have forgot Abigail, and —
Elizabeth: And I.
Proctor: Spare me! You forget nothin' and forgive nothin.' Learn charity, woman. I have gone tiptoe in this house all seven months since she is gone. I have not moved from there to here without I think to please you, and still an everlasting funeral marches round your heart. I cannot speak but I am doubted, every moment judged for lies, as though I come into a court when I come into this house!
Elizabeth: I do not judge you. The magistrate sits in your heart that judges you. I never thought you but a good man, John — only somewhat bewildered.
Proctor: Oh, Elizabeth, your justice would freeze beer!
“Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both.”
Source: The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt
Source: Fani-Kayode urges Buhari to take Okadigbo’s advice, Ifreke Inyang, 23 October 2017, Daily Post, Nigeria, 18 April 2018 http://dailypost.ng/2017/10/23/fani-kayode-urges-buhari-take-okadigbos-advice/,
Source: Rebuilding Russia: Reflections and Tentative Proposals
“True peace is not merely the absence of war, it is the presence of justice.”
Source: The Best That Money Can't Buy: Beyond Politics, Poverty, & War (2002), p. 33.
Interview http://veja.abril.com.br/240210/candidata-conquista-ninho-p-050.shtml to Veja magazine, February 24.
2010
Source: Germania (98), Chapter 36
“The four absolutes we all have in our minds: love, justice, evil, and forgiveness.”
Quoted in "Women of the Hall: Rosa Parks," http://womenshalloffame.org/women.php?action=viewone&id=117 Women's National Hall of Fame (undated); said upon her 77th birthday (1990-02-04)
“Nothing is black and white, and there is no purity and there is no such thing has justice.”
The Yoga of Nutrition, Editions Prosveta, 2012 ebook edition, pp. 24 https://books.google.it/books?id=jnoVCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT24-25.
Canto XIX, lines 58–63 (tr. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Paradiso
“When we understand this we see clearly that the subject round which the alternative senses play must be twofold. And we must therefore consider the subject of this work [the Divine Comedy] as literally understood, and then its subject as allegorically intended. The subject of the whole work, then, taken in the literal sense only is "the state of souls after death" without qualification, for the whole progress of the work hinges on it and about it. Whereas if the work be taken allegorically, the subject is "man as by good or ill deserts, in the exercise of the freedom of his choice, he becomes liable to rewarding or punishing justice."”
Hiis visis, manifestum est quod duplex oportet esse subiectum circa quod currant alterni sensus. Et ideo videndum est de subiecto huius operis, prout ad litteram accipitur; deinde de subiecto, prout allegorice sententiatur. Est ergo subiectum totius operis, litteraliter tantum accepti, status animarum post mortem simpliciter sumptus. Nam de illo et circa illum totius operis versatur processus. Si vero accipiatur opus allegorice, subiectum est homo, prout merendo et demerendo per arbitrii libertatem iustitie premiandi et puniendi obnoxius est.
Letter to Can Grande (Epistle XIII, 23–25), as translated by Charles Singleton in his essay "Two Kinds of Allegory" published in Dante Studies 1 (Harvard University Press, 1954), p. 87.
Epistolae (Letters)
Nahj al-Balagha
The Third Notebook: Part One
No Longer Human
“[Peace must be] founded on truth, built according to justice, vivified and integrated by charity, and put into practice in freedom.”
[Pacem esse] dicimus in veritate positam, ad iustitiae praecepta constitutam, caritate altam et expletam, libertate postremo auspice effectam.
Pacem in Terris (11 April 1963), ¶ 167
Page 28
Post-Presidency, Our Endangered Values (2005)
Source: Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis
“A society that has more justice is a society that needs less charity.”
“A man may stand for the justice of God, but a woman stands for His Mercy.”
Source: Life Is Worth Living
The Children of Light and the Children of Darkness (1944)
Source: The Essential Reinhold Niebuhr: Selected Essays and Addresses
Letter to three students (October 1967) as translated in Solzhenitsyn: A Documentary Record (1970) edited by Leopold Labedz (1970) “The Struggle Intensifies".
Speech at Founding Rally of the Organization of Afro-American Unity (28 June 1964) http://www.blackpast.org/?q=1964-malcolm-x-s-speech-founding-rally-organization-afro-american-unity
Variant: We declare our right on this earth to be a human being, to be respected as a human being, to be given the rights of a human being in this society, on this earth, in this day, which we intend to bring into existence by any means necessary.
As quoted in By Any Means Necessary (1970)
By any means necessary: speeches, interviews, and a letter (1970)
Context: We have formed an organization known as the Organization of Afro-American Unity which has the same aim and objective to fight whoever gets in our way, to bring about the complete independence of people of African descent here in the Western Hemisphere, and first here in the United States, and bring about the freedom of these people by any means necessary.
That's our motto. We want freedom by any means necessary. We want justice by any means necessary. We want equality by any means necessary.
1960s, Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963)
Variant: It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tired into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one destiny, affects all indirectly.
Source: Letter from the Birmingham Jail
Context: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
"Moral Beliefs"
Letter to his wife (Congo, My Country)
Claudette Colvin http://www.biography.com/people/claudette-colvin-11378 at biography.com, accessed 2 Nov 2013.
From a PBS interview with Amos Oz. The entire interview http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/jan-june02/oz_1-23.html
2012, Remarks at Clinton Global Initiative (September 2012)
God and the State (1871; publ. 1882)
Speech (1972), as quoted by Ioan Myrddin (1980), A Modern History of Somalia, Wilture Enterprises (International) Ltd.
Regarding the Vietnam War and conscription (1967) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeFMyrWlZ68
Source: Review of Communism and Man by F. J. Sheed in Peace News (27 January 1939)
‘Suffering and Speech’ in Catherine A MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin (eds) In Harm’s Way: The Pornography Civil Rights Hearings.
The Mysterious Stranger (1916)
1900s, The Strenuous Life: Essays and Addresses (1900), National Duties
Nahj al-Balagha
Board of County Commissioners, Wabaunsee County, Kansas, v. Umbehr, 518 U.S. 668 http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=U20028&friend=oyez, No. 94-1654 (1996, dissenting); decided June 28, 1996.
1990s
“Justice is the constant and perpetual will to render to every man his due.”
Iustitia est constans et perpetua voluntas ius suum cuique tribuendi.
[Mark, Tran, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/12/iceland-haven-freedom-speech-wikileaks?KeepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=600&width=990, Iceland plans future as global haven for freedom of speech, The Guardian, February 12, 2010, 2010-06-17]
As quoted in The World’s Great Speeches, Lewis Copeland and Lawrence Lamm, edit., Dover Publications Inc. (1958) p. 388
The Angostura Address (1819)
They may be considered as making a part, though a degraded part, of the families to which they belong.
Speech in the Virginia State Convention of 1829-1830, on the Question of the Ratio of Representation in the two Branches of the Legislature (2 December 1829) http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/slavery.html
1820s
"Politics and the English Language" (1946)
Context: The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable". The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning. Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. Statements like Marshal Petain was a true patriot, The Soviet press is the freest in the world, The Catholic Church is opposed to persecution, are almost always made with intent to deceive. Other words used in variable meanings, in most cases more or less dishonestly, are: class, totalitarian, science, progressive, reactionary, bourgeois, equality.
Source: Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871), Ch. XIX : Grand Pontiff, p. 321
Interview with Joseph Pearce, Sr. (2003)
Context: In different places over the years I have had to prove that socialism, which to many western thinkers is a sort of kingdom of justice, was in fact full of coercion, of bureaucratic greed and corruption and avarice, and consistent within itself that socialism cannot be implemented without the aid of coercion. Communist propaganda would sometimes include statements such as "we include almost all the commandments of the Gospel in our ideology". The difference is that the Gospel asks all this to be achieved through love, through self-limitation, but socialism only uses coercion. This is one point.
Untouched by the breath of God, unrestricted by human conscience, both capitalism and socialism are repulsive.
1900s, Inaugural Address (1905)
Context: While ever careful to refrain from wrongdoing others, we must be no less insistent that we are not wronged ourselves. We wish peace, but we wish the peace of justice, the peace of righteousness. We wish it because we think it is right and not because we are afraid. No weak nation that acts manfully and justly should ever have cause to fear us, and no strong power should ever be able to single us out as a subject for insolent aggression.
Baltimore Evening Sun (12 February 1923)
1920s
Context: The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth. He is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty — and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies.
Source: Posted on instagram @angelovulpini, September 2nd, 2021. https://www.instagram.com/p/CTVVtsfrRvh/
Source: https://quotepark.com/suggestions/create-quote/author/?originator_name=Angelo%20Vulpini
1790s, The Age of Reason, Part I (1794)
“Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical.”
Source: Dismantling America and Other Controversial Essays (2011), p.397
Variant: Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it.
Source: Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements
Source: Malcolm X Speaks (1965), p. 111
“Life is never fair, and perhaps it is a good thing for most of us that it is not.”
The Passionate State Of Mind, and Other Aphorisms (1955)
Source: Tao of Jeet Kune Do
“I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.”
Attributed in Lincoln Memorial (1882) edited by Osborn Oldroyd
Posthumous attributions
“Without justice and love, peace will always be a great illusion.”
Part III, Ch. VIII, 7, p. 223 https://archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala#page/223/mode/2up
On the Basis of Morality (1840)
Source: The Basis of Morality
Source: The Darkest Part of the Forest
J'accuse! (1898)
Context: These military tribunals have, decidedly, a most singular idea of justice.
This is the plain truth, Mr. President, and it is terrifying. It will leave an indelible stain on your presidency. I realise that you have no power over this case, that you are limited by the Constitution and your entourage. You have, nonetheless, your duty as a man, which you will recognise and fulfill. As for myself, I have not despaired in the least, of the triumph of right. I repeat with the most vehement conviction: truth is on the march, and nothing will stop it. Today is only the beginning, for it is only today that the positions have become clear: on one side, those who are guilty, who do not want the light to shine forth, on the other, those who seek justice and who will give their lives to attain it. I said it before and I repeat it now: when truth is buried underground, it grows and it builds up so much force that the day it explodes it blasts everything with it. We shall see whether we have been setting ourselves up for the most resounding of disasters, yet to come.
“Parents are not interested in justice, they're interested in peace and quiet.”
“Without the fear of God, men do not even observe justice and charity among themselves.”
Source: Institutes of the Christian Religion
Variant: I’ve had enough of someone else’s propaganda… I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I’m for justice, no matter who it is for or against. I’m a human being first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.
Source: The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Source: The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965), p. 400
Context: I've had enough of someone else's propaganda. I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it's for or against. I'm a human being first and foremost, and as such I am for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.
2014, Remarks to the People of Estonia (September 2014)
1770s, African Slavery in America (March 1775)
Ibn Shu’ba al-Harrani, Tuhaf al-'Uqul, p. 298
1900s, Inaugural Address (1905)
"Give!" (26 March 1944)
Variant translation: How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before beginning to improve the world! [...] You can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness!
Tales from the Secret Annex
