“The trouble with the death penalty has always been that nobody wanted it for everybody, but everybody differed about who should get off.”

—  Albert Pierrepoint

Executioner: Pierrepoint. Harrap 1974. p. 211.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The trouble with the death penalty has always been that nobody wanted it for everybody, but everybody differed about wh…" by Albert Pierrepoint?
Albert Pierrepoint photo
Albert Pierrepoint 3
English executioner 1905–1992

Related quotes

Linah Mohohlo photo

“It has been said that everybody’s business is nobody’s business. This is not true with respect to productivity; it is truly everybody’s business.”

Linah Mohohlo (1952–2021) Botswana banker

Source: PRODUCTIVITY WEEK DINNER DANCE ADDRESS https://www.bankofbotswana.bw/sites/default/files/speech-documents/productivity-week-dance-october-25-2001.pdf (October 25, 2001)

Joe Louis photo

“Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die. ”

Joe Louis (1914–1981) American boxer
Jean Cocteau photo

“In Paris, everybody wants to be an actor; nobody is content to be a spectator.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

Le Coq et l’Arlequin (1918)

Mark Twain photo

“Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Notes on sourcing http://www.bartleby.com/73/1982.html
Twain did say:
: "There is a sumptuous variety about the New England weather that compels the stranger's admiration — and regret. The weather is always doing something there … In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours. ...
Yes, one of the brightest gems in the New England weather is the dazzling uncertainty of it."
:* Speech at the dinner of New England Society in New York City (22 December 1876)
Misattributed

Lev Grossman photo

“Everybody wanted to be the hero of their own story. Nobody wanted to be comic relief.”

Lev Grossman The Magician King

Source: The Magician King

Samuel Johnson photo

“He who praises everybody praises nobody.”

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) English writer

Johnson's Works (1787), vol. XI, p. 216; This set included the Life of Samuel Johnson by Sir John Hawkins

Mark Twain photo

“Definition of a classic — something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Quoting or paraphrasing a Professor Winchester in "Disappearance of Literature" http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=TwaSpee.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=52&division=div1, speech at the Nineteenth Century Club, New York, 20 November 1900, in Mark Twain's Speeches (1910), ed. William Dean Howells, p. 194 http://books.google.com/books?id=7etXZ5Q17ngC&pg=PA194
Variant: A classic – something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.

P. J. O'Rourke photo

“Everybody wants to save the earth; nobody wants to help Mom do the dishes.”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

All the Trouble in the World (1994)

Northrop Frye photo

“The bedrock of doubt is the total nothingness of death. Death is a leveler, not because everybody dies, but because nobody understands what death means.”

Northrop Frye (1912–1991) Canadian literary critic and literary theorist

Source: "Quotes", The Great Code: The Bible and Literature (1982), Chapter 8, p. 230

Related topics