Quotes about jail (350 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“If it's illegal to rock and roll, then throw me in jail.”

Kurt Cobain (1967–1994) American musician and artist

“To stand up for truth is nothing. For truth, you must sit in jail.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Russian writer

Truth

“If someone were to harm my family or a friend or somebody I love, I would eat them. I might end up in jail for 500 years, but I would eat them.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

Love , Family

“The reason I sell 6 million records, the reason I could go to jail and come out without a scratch, the reason I can walk around, the reason I am who I am today is because I can look directly in to my face and find my soul, it's there, it's not sold, i didn't sell it, it's still within me, I still feel it, my heart is still connected to my body.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

1990s, Interview on the set of Gang Related (1996)

Feeling , Soul , Heart

“If I went to jail, at least I wouldn't have to sign autographs.”

Kurt Cobain (1967–1994) American musician and artist

As quoted in Details (1992-02).
Interviews (1989-1994), Print

“I am speechless about the idea of putting music fans in jail for downloading music. It is wrong to illegally download, but the answer cannot be jail. Here in America we create new opportunities out of adversity, not punitive laws, and we should look to new technologies like Apple's new Music Store for solutions. This way, innovation continues to be the hallmark of America. It is the fans that drive the success of the music business.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

Press statement (21 July 2003), quoted in "Jackson attacks music piracy bill" in BBC News (22 July 2003) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3085987.stm

Law , Music , Way , Idea

“The beauty, the poetry of the fear in their eyes. I didn't mind going to jail for, what, five, six hours? It was absolutely worth it.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

Fear , Beauty

“I did not want to be mistreated, I did not want to be deprived of a seat that I had paid for. It was just time… there was opportunity for me to take a stand to express the way I felt about being treated in that manner. I had not planned to get arrested. I had plenty to do without having to end up in jail. But when I had to face that decision, I didn't hesitate to do so because I felt that we had endured that too long. The more we gave in, the more we complied with that kind of treatment, the more oppressive it became.”

Rosa Parks (1913–2005) African-American civil rights activist

"Parks Recalls Bus Boycott, Excerpts from an interview with Lynn Neary", National Public Radio (1992), linked at "Civil Rights Icon Rosa Parks Dies" http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4973548, NPR, October 25, 2005.

Way , Decision , Time

“This country has nothing to fear from the crooked man who fails. We put him in jail. It is the crooked man who succeeds who is a threat to this country.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

Address in Memphis, Tennessee (25 October 1905) http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly
1900s

Fear , Country

“The thing that I think very striking is that no one, or no one I can remember, ever writes of an execution with approval. The dominant note is always horror. Society, apparently, cannot get along without capital punishment—for there are some people whom it is simply not safe to leave alive—and yet there is no one, when the pinch comes, who feels it right to kill another human being in cold blood. I watched a man hanged once. There was no question that everybody concerned knew this to be a dreadful, unnatural action. I believe it is always the same—the whole jail, warders and prisoners alike, is upset when there is an execution. It is probably the fact that capital punishment is accepted as necessary, and yet instinctively felt to be wrong, that gives so many descriptions of executions their tragic atmosphere. They are mostly written by people who have actually watched an execution and feel it to be a terrible and only partly comprehensible experience which they want to record; whereas battle literature is largely written by people who have never heard a gun go off and think of a battle as a sort of football match in which nobody gets hurt.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"As I Please" column in The Tribune (3 November 1944)<sup> http://alexpeak.com/twr/oocp/</sup>
"As I Please" (1943–1947)

People , Feeling , Literature , Question

“Fascist was, by definition, a person who happened to have been in jail in a communist country.”

Leszek Kolakowski (1927–2009) Philosopher, historian of ideas

"My Correct Views on Everything" (1974)
Context: When I collect my experiences, I notice that fascist is a person who holds one of the following beliefs (by way of example): 1) That people should wash themselves, rather than go dirty; 2) that freedom of the press in America is preferable to the ownership of the whole press by one ruling party; 3) that people should not be jailed for their opinions. both communist and anti-communist - 4), that racial criteria, in favour of either whites or blacks, are inadvisable in admission to Universities; 5 ) that torture is condemnable, no matter who applies it. (Roughly speaking "fascist" was the same as "liberal".) Fascist was, by definition, a person who happened to have been in jail in a communist country. The refugees from Czechoslovakia in 1968 were sometimes met in Germany by very progressive and absolutely revolutionary leftists with placards saying "fascism will not pass".

Personality , Country

“If your boss is getting you down, look at him through the prongs of a fork and imagine him in jail.”

Ricky Gervais (1961) English comedian, actor, director, producer, musician, writer, and former radio presenter

Imagination

“Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. It won't fatten the dog.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

School , Dogs , Time

“They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings steal a little and they throw you in jail. Steal a lot and then they make you king.”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

“Jace shook his blond head in exasperation.
"You had to make a crazy jail friend, didn't you? You couldn't just count ceiling tiles or tame a pet mouse like normal prisoners do?”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“Be thine own palace, or the world's thy jail.”

John Donne (1572–1631) English poet

Source: The Poems of John Donne; Miscellaneous Poems (Songs and Sonnets) Elegies. Epithalamions, or Marriage Songs. Satires. Epigrams. the Progress of

World

“I’ve wrestled with alligators,
I’ve tussled with a whale.
I done handcuffed lightning
And throw thunder in jail.
You know I’m bad.
just last week, I murdered a rock,
Injured a stone, Hospitalized a brick.
I’m so mean, I make medicine sick.”

Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) African American boxer, philanthropist and activist

A poem about his match with George Foreman, known as the Rumble in the Jungle (1974)
Context: Last night I had a dream, When I got to Africa,
I had one hell of a rumble.
I had to beat Tarzan’s behind first,
For claiming to be King of the Jungle.
For this fight, I’ve wrestled with alligators,
I’ve tussled with a whale.
I done handcuffed lightning
And throw thunder in jail.
You know I’m bad.
just last week, I murdered a rock,
Injured a stone, Hospitalized a brick.
I’m so mean, I make medicine sick.
I’m so fast, man,
I can run through a hurricane and don't get wet.
When George Foreman meets me,
He’ll pay his debt.
I can drown the drink of water, and kill a dead tree.
Wait till you see Muhammad Ali.

“The highways are crowded with people who drive as if their sole purpose in getting behind the wheel is to avenge every wrong done them by man, beast or fate. The only thing that keeps them in line is their fear of death, jail and lawsuits.”

Hunter S. Thompson (1937–2005) American journalist and author

Source: Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga

Death , Fate , People , Fear

“When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'.”

Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American comedian

“Is all the world jails and churches?”

Zack de la Rocha (1970) American musician, poet rapper and activist best known as the vocalist and lyricist of rap metal band Rage Again…

Vietnow.
Song lyrics, Evil Empire (1996)

World

“I'm known as a survivor now, I hope so, for the jail thing, bullets and everything, controversies and everything, I hope so. And I want to be in the future known as somebody. You know I want people to be talking about me like you know: "remember when he was real bad, remember when Tupac was real bad". You know what I mean, they do that about a lot of actors now, like John Travolta I read stories like "remember you were wild". And all these other people, and now they're like sweet hearts. We all should get that chance, I just want my chance.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

1990s, MTV interview with Tabitha Soren (1995)

People , Hope , Chance , Reading

“It's like, you hungry, you reached your level. We asked ten years ago. We was asking with the Panthers. We was asking with them, the Civil Rights Movement. We was asking. Those people that asked are dead and in jail. So now what do you think we're gonna do? Ask?”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Posthumous attributions, Tupac: Resurrection (2003)

People , Thinking , Dead

“You don’t know how to handle anything today, because you have to go to jail to get some press or fall down drunk.”

Liza Minnelli (1946) American actress and singer

October 26, 2007. The Washington Blade.

“You know when you're [driving] drunk, you're like [Imitates car driving and going over the bumps on the edge of the road], behind you, you hear [Imitates big rig horn] [slurring] "Shut up, stupid!" You know, if you hear the magical sound [Imitates police siren], one of two things will pop in your head. Either one, [slurring] "I'm okay, I'm fine…I can beat this." Or two, [police siren] "I'm gonna go to jail. Ima gonna jail. Hey, gonna hafta let you go babe, Ima gonna jail. Tell the kids I love 'em, bye."”

Gabriel Iglesias (1976) American actor

Hot & Fluffy (2007)

Love , Stupidity , Cars

“I also did some jail time a few years ago. Spent a whole summer in jail reading books. I pumped a ton of new knowledge and new thinking into myself.”

Tommy Lee (1962) American drummer

http://www.malibumag.com/onlinemagazine/junejuly05/tommylee.htm.

Books , Knowledge , Thinking , Time

“While people are celebrating on Sunday we shouldn't forget the people who fought for lifting this ban are in jail.”

Manal al-Sharif (1979) Saudi Arabian activist

About lifting of the ban on women driving in Saudi Arabia. As quoted in Saudi women 'still enslaved', says activist as driving ban ends http://news.trust.org/item/20180622172634-f882k/ (22 June 2018) by Heba Kanso, Thomson Reuters Foundation.

People , Forgetting

“Now, there’s no easy answer for resolving all these social forces, and we must respect the meaning that people draw from their own traditions -- from their religion, from their ethnicity, from their sense of nationhood. But I do not believe progress is possible if our desire to preserve our identities gives way to an impulse to dehumanize or dominate another group. If our religion leads us to persecute those of another faith, if we jail or beat people who are gay, if our traditions lead us to prevent girls from going to school, if we discriminate on the basis of race or tribe or ethnicity, then the fragile bonds of civilization will fray. The world is too small, we are too packed together, for us to be able to resort to those old ways of thinking.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2016, United Nations Address (September 2016)

People , World , School , Faith

“And yet they chose a different path. In the face of hatred, they prayed for their tormentors. In the face of violence, they stood up and sat in, with the moral force of nonviolence. Willingly, they went to jail to protest unjust laws, their cells swelling with the sound of freedom songs. A lifetime of indignities had taught them that no man can take away the dignity and grace that God grants us. They had learned through hard experience what Frederick Douglass once taught -- that freedom is not given, it must be won, through struggle and discipline, persistence and faith.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2013, "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony (August 2013)
Context: p>But we would do well to recall that day itself also belonged to those ordinary people whose names never appeared in the history books, never got on TV. Many had gone to segregated schools and sat at segregated lunch counters. They lived in towns where they couldn’t vote and cities where their votes didn’t matter. They were couples in love who couldn’t marry, soldiers who fought for freedom abroad that they found denied to them at home. They had seen loved ones beaten, and children fire-hosed, and they had every reason to lash out in anger, or resign themselves to a bitter fate.And yet they chose a different path. In the face of hatred, they prayed for their tormentors. In the face of violence, they stood up and sat in, with the moral force of nonviolence. Willingly, they went to jail to protest unjust laws, their cells swelling with the sound of freedom songs. A lifetime of indignities had taught them that no man can take away the dignity and grace that God grants us. They had learned through hard experience what Frederick Douglass once taught -- that freedom is not given, it must be won, through struggle and discipline, persistence and faith.</p

God , Faith , Law , Freedom

“All I can say right now is the US Government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me. Truth is coming, and it cannot be stopped.”

Edward Snowden (1983) American whistleblower and former National Security Agency contractor

Interview with Glenn Greenwald, 6 June 2013, Part 1

Truth

“If your not cheering for me, for what I'm doing, don't cheer for me. Don't cheer cause you think I'm cute, you know what I'm saying, screw that. Cheer for me for what I'm doing, for what I stand for, and when I go to jail you should cheer louder.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

1990s, Ed Gordon interview (1994)

Thinking

“We will wait for him like a good wife waiting for her husband who is in jail.”

Jürgen Klopp (1967) German association football player and manager

Klopp on another injury of Mats Hummels

Waiting

“Claggert: We must serve the law, sir, or give up the right and privilege of service. It is only within that law that we may use our discretions according to our rank.
Captain Vere: You're so intelligent and so lucid for the rank you hold, Master At Arms.
Claggert: I thank you, sir.
Captain Vere: Yes, that's no flattery, Mr. Claggart. It's a melancholy fact. It's sad to see such qualities of mind bent to such a sorry purpose. What's the reason for it?
Claggert: I am what I am, sir. And what the world has made me.
Captain Vere: The world? The world demands that behind every peacemaker there be the gun, the gallows, the jail. Do you think it will always be so?
Claggert: I have no reason not to, sir.
Captain Vere: You live without hope?
Claggert: I live.
Captain Vere: But remember, Mr. Claggart, that even the man who wields the whip cannot defy the code we must obey and not be broken by it. That will be all.”

Peter Ustinov (1921–2004) English actor, writer, and dramatist

Billy Budd (1962)

World , Sadness , Law , Hope

“Feminism has taught women to sue men for sexual harassment or date rape when men initiate with the wrong person or with the wrong timing; no one has taught men to sue women for sexual trauma for saying “yes,” then “no,” then “yes.” … Men [are] still expected to initiate, but now, if they [do] it badly, they could go to jail.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part 1: The Myth of Male Power, p. 16.

Women , Men , Time , Personality

“What? I thought you came down right on the side of go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred dollars. 'The Law is the Law, Isabelle.' What was all that you were spouting?”

Cassandra Clare The Mortal Instruments

Jace to Alec, pg. 313
The Mortal Instruments, City of Ashes (2008)

Law

“If it was up to me, if you uttered the word 'gun control,' we'd put you in jail.”

Ted Nugent (1948) American rock musician

Source: From a speech at the 2011 NRA Convention.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/01/us-nra-convention-idUSTRE7402SL20110501

“In this country, don’t forget, a habit is no damn private hell. There’s no solitary confinement outside of jail. A habit is hell for those you love. And in this country it’s the worst kind of hell for those who love you.”

Billie Holiday book Lady Sings the Blues

Source: Lady Sings the Blues (1956), Ch. 24.

Love , Hell , Country , Forgetting

“When you're young, you're stupid. You do silly things. I did it (the O-Z-Z-Y tattoo across his knuckles) when I was 14. I was in jail for something. I could have had it removed, but why? It's my trademark. People stop me and say, 'Let me have a look at your hand.”

Ozzy Osbourne (1948) English heavy metal vocalist and songwriter

Launch.com October 30, 1998

People , Stupidity , Tattoo

“Jail is big business, believe me. I'm in jail, I see the big business. You can feed a whole town off one jail. This jail is in the middle of a town that feeds everybody. Everybody works here, this is the main income. So if there were no criminals, nobody would work.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

1990s, Prison interviews and interrogations (1995)

Business

“I’ve said this before -- when human rights are denied and citizens have no opportunity to redress their grievances peacefully, it feeds terrorist propaganda that justifies violence. Likewise, when political opponents are treated like terrorists and thrown in jail, it can be a self-fulfilling prophecy. So the real path to lasting stability and progress is not less democracy; I believe it is more democracy in terms of free speech, and freedom of religion, rule of law, strong civil societies. All that has to play a part in countering violent extremism.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2015, Leaders' Summit on Countering ISIL and Violent Extremism speech (September 2015)

Religion , Law , Democracy , Freedom

“When it shall be said in any country in the world, my poor are happy; neither ignorance nor distress is to be found among them; my jails are empty of prisoners, my streets of beggars; the aged are not in want, the taxes are not oppressive; the rational world is my friend, because I am a friend of its happiness: When these things can be said, then may the country boast of its constitution and its government.”

Thomas Paine book Rights of Man

Part 2.7 Chapter V. Ways and means of improving the condition of Europe, interspersed with miscellaneous observations
1790s, Rights of Man, Part 2 (1792)

Age , World , Country , Happiness

“To our most bitter opponents we say: "We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws because noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. Throw us in jail and we shall still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we shall win freedom but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process and our victory will be a double victory."”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1950s, Loving Your Enemies (Christmas 1957)

Love , Children , Law , Home

“The arc of the moral universe may bend towards justice, but it doesn’t bend on its own. To secure the gains this country has made requires constant vigilance, not complacency. Whether by challenging those who erect new barriers to the vote, or ensuring that the scales of justice work equally for all, and the criminal justice system is not simply a pipeline from underfunded schools to overcrowded jails, it requires vigilance. And we'll suffer the occasional setback. But we will win these fights.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2013, "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony (August 2013)
Context: To dismiss the magnitude of this progress -- to suggest, as some sometimes do, that little has changed -- that dishonors the courage and the sacrifice of those who paid the price to march in those years. Medgar Evers, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner, Martin Luther King Jr. -- they did not die in vain. Their victory was great. But we would dishonor those heroes as well to suggest that the work of this nation is somehow complete. The arc of the moral universe may bend towards justice, but it doesn’t bend on its own. To secure the gains this country has made requires constant vigilance, not complacency. Whether by challenging those who erect new barriers to the vote, or ensuring that the scales of justice work equally for all, and the criminal justice system is not simply a pipeline from underfunded schools to overcrowded jails, it requires vigilance. And we'll suffer the occasional setback. But we will win these fights. This country has changed too much. People of goodwill, regardless of party, are too plentiful for those with ill will to change history’s currents.

School , Justice , Suffering , Universe

“Learning … should be a joy and full of excitement. It is life's greatest adventure; it is an illustrated excursion into the minds of noble and learned men, not a conducted tour through a jail.”

Taylor Caldwell (1900–1985) Novelist

The Sound of Thunder (1957) Pt. I, Ch. 9
1950s
Context: Learning … should be a joy and full of excitement. It is life's greatest adventure; it is an illustrated excursion into the minds of noble and learned men, not a conducted tour through a jail. So its surroundings should be as gracious as possible, to complement it.

Life , Men , Learning , Joy

“As we were very much pressed for time we were unable to see as much of the jail as we wanted to. We had an impression that we had been shown the brighter side of jail life. Nonetheless, two facts stood out. One was that we had actually seen desirable and radical improvements over the old system prevailing even now in most countries and the second and even more important fact was the mentality of the prison officials, and presumably the higher officials of the government also, in regard to jails. Actual conditions may or may not be good but the general principles laid down for jails are certainly far in advance of anything we had known elsewhere in practice. Anyone with a knowledge of prisons in India and of the barbarous way in which handcuffs, fetters and other punishments are used will appreciate the difference. The governor of the prison in Moscow who took us round was all the time laying stress on the human side of jail life, and how it was their endeavour to keep this in the front and not to make the prisoner feel in any way dehumanised or outcasted. I wish we in India would remember this wholesome principle and practise it in our daily lives even outside jail…. It can be said without a shadow of doubt that to be in a Russian prison is far more preferable than to be a worker in an Indian factory, whose lot is 10 to 11 hours work a day and then to live in a crowded and dark and airless tenement, hardly fit for an animal. The mere fact that there are some prisons like the ones we saw is in itself something for the Soviet Government to be proud of.”

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) Indian lawyer, statesman, and writer, first Prime Minister of India

Soviet Russia: Some Random Sketches and Impressions (1949)

Time , Country , Animals , Knowledge

“Animals are sentient beings who feel pain and suffering, so we are writing that principle into law and ensuring that we protect their welfare. Our plans will also increase sentences for those who commit the most heinous acts of animal cruelty to five years in jail. We are a nation of animal lovers so we will make Brexit work not just for citizens but for the animals we love and cherish too.”

Michael Gove (1967) British politician

Michael Gove: I'll make Brexit work for animals too https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42313313, BBC News, 12 December 2017
2017

Pain , Law , Suffering , Animals

“When you have a precedent set like that, and you have somebody, George Tenet, acknowledging in his book that he knew that the administration was deceiving the American people into a situation that is murdering young men and women from this country and others, that George Tenet and Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice and George Bush, et al., should be in fucking jail.”

Sean Penn (1960) American actor, screenwriter, and film director

On Real Time with Bill Maher (2007-05-18)

Country , People , Books , Women

“I'm known as a survivor now, I hope so, for the jail thing, bullets and everything, controversies and everything, I hope so. And I want to be in the future known as somebody. You know I want people to be talking about me like you know: "remember when he was real bad, remember when Tupac was real bad". You know what I mean, they do that about a lot of actors now, like John Travolta I read stories like "remember you were wild."”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

And all these other people, and now they're like sweet hearts. We all should get that chance, I just want my chance.
1990s, MTV interview with Tabitha Soren (1995)

Reading , Bad luck , Future , People

“The more time I spent in jail, the more I realized that the law isn’t rational at all. It’s a lottery. What color is your skin? How much money do you have? Who’s your lawyer? Who’s the judge?”

Trevor Noah book Born a Crime

page 238
Born a Crime

Money , Time , Color , Law

“Steve Jobs, the pioneer of the computer as a jail made cool.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

sin fuentes

“I, had an excellent instructor. One that you currently have locked up. If you want to talk about skills going to waste, then go look in your own jail.”

Richelle Mead book Spirit Bound

Source: Spirit Bound

“It is a frightful satire and an epigram on the modern age that the only use it knows for solitude is to make it a punishment, a jail sentence.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

Age , Solitude

“I was kind of excited to go to jail for the first time and I learnt some great dialogue.”

Quentin Tarantino (1963) American film director, screenwriter, producer, and actor

Time

“It'd be great to be so famous that if I murder someone, I will never, ever, ever serve any jail time, even if it's totally obvious to everyone that I did it.”

Mindy Kaling book Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Source: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Time

“But look what the Church has done to Jesus during the last two thousand years. What they have made of Him. How they have turned every word He spoke for their own vile ends. Jesus would be framed and in jail if he was living today.”

Carson McCullers book The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter

Source: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

“I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" — one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, (1963)
Source: I Have A Dream

Faith , Beauty , Dreams , Hope

“As long as possible live free and uncommitted. It makes but little difference whether you are committed to a farm or the county jail.”

Henry David Thoreau book Walden ou la vie dans les bois

Source: Walden

“I'm a substitute mom."
"You're more like a crazy aunt who only gets called when somebody needs bailing out of jail.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Burns

Moms

“Poor people wait a lot. Welfare, unemployment lines, laundromats, phone booths, emergency rooms, jails, etc.”

Lucia Berlin (1936–2004) American writer

Source: A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories

People , Waiting

“The Founding Fathers in their wisdom decided that children were an unnatural strain on parents. So they provided jails called schools, equipped with tortures called an education. School is where you go between when your parents can’t take you and industry can’t take you.”

John Updike book The Centaur

Source: The Centaur (1963), Ch. 4

Wisdom , Children , Education , School

“Rose: "Did you hotwire this car? Did you steal this car?"
Dimitri: "You have an interesting set of morals. Breaking out of jail is okay. But steal a car, and you sound totally outraged."
- Rose Hathaway and Dimitri Belikov (Last Sacrifice)”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Source: Last Sacrifice

Cars

“It was better to be in a jail where you could bang the walls than in a jail you could not see.”

Carson McCullers book The Member of the Wedding

Source: The Member of the Wedding

“You have an interesting set of morals," he observed. "Breaking out of jail is okay. But steal a car, and you sound totally outraged.”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Source: Last Sacrifice

Cars

“I'd watched too many schoolmates graduate into mental institutions, into group homes and jails, and I knew that locking people up was paranormal - against normal, not beside it. Locks didn't cure; they strangled.”

Scott Westerfeld book The Last Days

Source: The Last Days

People , Home

“What? You’d dare drink right after getting out of jail for intoxication?”
That’s when you need a drink the most.”

Charles Bukowski book Factotum

Source: Factotum

Drink

“You're like the thief who isn't the least bit sorry he stole, but is terribly, terribly sorry he's going to jail. - Rhett Butler”

Margaret Mitchell book Vom Winde verweht (1937 German edition)

Source: Gone with the Wind

“Apparently unaffected, she rose. "Yeah, you're probably right. I should be going." She feigned a yawn. "You've gotta head back to work and I've gotta head to jail. Big night for me. I'm planning to shiv someone for a bar of soap. --”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Dreams of a Dark Warrior

Night

“Okay, first thing tomorrow we hit the streets around Taccone's place. Somebody saw something.'

'I got it covered.'

'The DiMarcos might be in town.'

'Actually, they're in jail.'

'All seven of them?'

Hale shrugged. 'It was an interesting October.”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

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

Robert Anton Wilson (1932–2007) American author and polymath

Source: Cosmic Trigger 2: Down to Earth

Intelligence

“What happened to cause the jail fight? (Maggie)
They thought it would be fun to knock around the ‘kid’ and show off their manhood. I thought it would be fun to knock a couple of them unconscious. (Wren)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Unleash the Night

Fight

“WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE: RAPUNZEL
For horse thieving, kidnapping, jail breaking, and using her hair in a manner other than nature intended!
REWARD”

Shannon Hale (1974) American fantasy novelist

Source: Rapunzel's Revenge

Nature , Horse , Dead

“I don't like jail, they got the wrong kind of bars in there”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

“No, that's not possible," Michael said. "Killed, yes; jail, no.”

Mario Puzo The Godfather

Source: The Godfather

“I'm too pretty to go to jail.”

Mike Murphy (political consultant) (1962) American political consultant

As quoted in "Debriefing Mike Murphy" https://www.weeklystandard.com/matt-labash/debriefing-mike-murphy (18 March 2016), by Matt Labash, The Weekly Standard
2010s

“Jefferson thought schools would produce free men: we prove him right by putting dropouts in jail.”

Benjamin R. Barber (1939–2017) US political scientist

A Passion for Democracy: American Essays (2000) p. 211

Men , School

“When the strike started in 1965, most of our friends forsook us for a while. They ran — or were just too busy to help. But the California Migrant Ministry held a meeting with its staff and decided that the strike was a matter of life or death for farm workers everywhere, and that even if it meant the end of the Migrant Ministry they would turn over their resources to the strikers. The political pressure on the Protestant Churches was tremendous and the Migrant Ministry lost a lot of money. But they stuck it out, and they began to point the way to the rest of the Church. In fact, when 30 of the strikers were arrested for shouting Huelga [Strike], 11 ministers went to jail with them.”

Cesar Chavez (1927–1993) American farm worker, labor leader, and civil rights activist

The Mexican-American and the Church (1968)

Life , Death , Money , Way

“What makes The Joker tick I wonder?” Fredric said. “I mean what are his real motivations?”
“Consider him at any level of conduct,” Bruce said slowly, “in the home, on the street, in interpersonal relations, in jail—always there is an extraordinary contradiction. He is dirty and compulsively neat, aloof and desperately gregarious, enthusiastic and sullen, generous and stingy, a snappy dresser and a scarecrow, a gentleman and a boor, given to extremes of happiness and despair, singularly well able to apply himself and capable of frittering away a lifetime in trivial pursuits, decorous and unseemly, kind and cruel, tolerant yet open to the most outrageous varieties of bigotry, a great friend and an implacable enemy, a lover and abominator of women, sweet-spoken and foul-mouthed, a rake and a puritan, swelling with hubris and haunted by inferiority, outcast and social climber, felon and philanthropist, barbarian and patron of the arts, enamored of novelty and solidly conservative, philosopher and fool, Republican and Democrat, large of soul and unbearably petty, distant and brimming with friendly impulses, an inveterate liar and astonishingly strict with petty cash, adventurous and timid, imaginative and stolid, malignly destructive and a planter of trees on Arbor Day—I tell you frankly, the man is a mess.”
“That’s extremely well said Bruce,” Fredric stated. “I think you’ve given a very thoughtful analysis.”

Donald Barthelme (1931–1989) American writer, editor, and professor

“I was paraphrasing what Mark Schorer said about Sinclair Lewis,” Bruce replied.
“The Joker’s Greatest Triumph”.
Come Back, Dr. Caligari (1964)

Women , Fools , Art , Home

“Why can't we be friends now?' said the other, holding him affectionately. 'It's what I want. It's what you want.' But the horses didn't want it — they swerved apart: the earth didn't want it, sending up rocks through which riders must pass single file; the temple, the tank, the jail, the palace, the birds, the carrion, the Guest House, that came into view as they emerged from the gap and saw Mau beneath: they didn't want it, they said in their hundred voices 'No, not yet,' and the sky said 'No, not there.”

E.M. Forster book A Passage to India

Source: A Passage to India (1924), Ch. 37

Bird , Horse , Housing

“There is a striking kinship between our movement and Margaret Sanger's early efforts. She, like we, saw the horrifying conditions of ghetto life. Like we, she knew that all of society is poisoned by cancerous slums. Like we, she was a direct actionist — a nonviolent resister. She was willing to accept scorn and abuse until the truth she saw was revealed to the millions. At the turn of the century she went into the slums and set up a birth control clinic, and for this deed she went to jail because she was violating an unjust law. Yet the years have justified her actions. She launched a movement which is obeying a higher law to preserve human life under humane conditions. Margaret Sanger had to commit what was then called a crime in order to enrich humanity, and today we honor her courage and vision; for without them there would have been no beginning. Our sure beginning in the struggle for equality by nonviolent direct action may not have been so resolute without the tradition established by Margaret Sanger and people like her. Negroes have no mere academic nor ordinary interest in family planning. They have a special and urgent concern.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Family Planning - A Special and Urgent Concern (1966)

Life , People , Truth , Family

“I believe that we cannot survive as a democratic country when we are supporting someone like Thieu in Saigon, who has put 300,000 political prisoners in jail because they've spoken in favor of peace. I just don't believe that when a Republican Party bugs the Democratic Party headquarters, that that smacks of democracy. These kind of things I speak out against. That doesn't mean I'm a Communist.”

Jane Fonda (1937) American actress and activist

Interview by Phil Donahue (1972)

Peace , Democracy , Support , Country

“Writers, artists, and commentators on websites are detained or thrown into jail when they reflect on democracy, opening up, reform and reason. This is the reality of China.”

Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist

Higgins, Charlotte. " Ai Weiwei: ‘China in many ways is just like the middle ages http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/apr/11/ai-weiwei-china-last-interview." Guardian.co.uk., April 11, 2011.
2010-, 2011

Democracy , Reality

“They are arrayed against every principle for which we stand. So when the Soviet leaders jail a writer, or a priest, or a doctor or a worker, for the crime of speaking freely, it is not only for humanitarian reasons that we should be concerned. For these acts reveal a regime that is afraid of truth and liberty; it dare not allow its people to enjoy the freedoms we take for granted, and a nation that denies those freedoms to its own people will have few scruples in denying them to others. If detente is to progress then it ought to mean that the Soviet authorities relax their ruthless opposition to all forms and expressions of dissent.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Chelsea Conservative Association (26 July 1975) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102750
Leader of the Opposition

People , Truth , Freedom

“He imprisons and tortures at Guantanamo. He imprisoned and tortured at Abu Ghraib. He has secret torture chambers in Europe. Yes, he imprisons even here in the United States, with his jails carrying more blacks than his universities can ever enroll. He even suspends the provisions of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. Take Guantanamo for example; at that concentration camp international law does not apply. The national laws of the people there do not apply. Laws of the United States of America do not apply. Only Bush's law applies. Can the international community accept being lectured by this man on the provisions of the universal declaration of human rights? Definitely not!”

Robert Mugabe (1924–2019) former President of Zimbabwe

Speech to the United Nations General Assembly (26 September 2007)
2000s, 2005 - 2009

People , Secret , Law , Communication

“Tax revenues are up 59 percent since 1980. Because of our economic growth? No. During Carter's four years, we had growth of 37.2 percent; Reagan's five years have given us 30.7 percent. The new revenues are due to four giant Republican tax increases since 1981. All republicans rightly chastised Carter for his $38 billion deficit. But they ignore or even defend deficits of $220 billion, as government spending has grown 10.4 percent per year since Reagan took office, while the federal payroll has zoomed by a quarter of a million bureaucrats… big government has been legitimized in a way the Democrats never could have accomplished. It was tragic to listen to Ronald Reagan on the 1986 campaign trail bragging about his high spending on farm subsidies, welfare, warfare, etc… the IRS has grown bigger, richer, more powerful, and more arrogant. In the words of the founders of our country, our government has "sent hither swarms" of tax gatherers "to harass our people and eat out their substance." His officers jailed the innocent George Hansen, with the President refusing to pardon a great American whose only crime was to defend the Constitution. Reagan's new tax "reform" gives even more power to the IRS. Far from making taxes fairer or simpler, it deceitfully raises more revenue for the government to waste… I want to totally disassociate myself from the policies that have given us unprecedented deficits, massive monetary inflation, indiscriminate military spending, an irrational and unconstitutional foreign policy, zooming foreign aid, the exaltation of international banking, and the attack on our personal liberties and privacy.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

Letter to chairman of the RNC http://www.textfiles.com/politics/ron_paul.txt Frank Fahrenkopf (March 1987).
1980s

People , Way , Personality , Country

“Many if not most of Kissinger's partners in crime are now in jail, or are awaiting trial, or have been otherwise punished or discredited. His own lonely impunity is rank; it smells to heaven. If it is allowed to persist then we shall shamefully vindicate the philosopher Anacharsis, who mantained that laws were like cobwebs; strong enough to detain only the weak, and too weak to hold the strong. In the name of innumerable victims known and unknown, it is time for justice to take a hand.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

[The Trial of Henry Kissinger, 2002, 1859846319, 46240330, [E840.8.K58 H58 2001]]
2000s, 2002

Justice , Law , Strong , Time

“[Men] who would rather go to jail than betray what they believe to be their duty to their fellow workers and the principles which they hold.”

Tony Benn (1925–2014) British Labour Party politician

From an issued statement from Mr. Benn on five dockers imprisoned for contempt of court (21 July 1972)
1970s

Men

“My father rarely spoke of life before [he left Cuba]. About prison, he jsut said, "That man is a genius at PR." Castro would come to the jail in the middle of the night and ask the prisoners, "What are you doing here? Don't you see we're trying to do the right thing?" The reason I'm not more political is because I have music. And from a young age, I needed it. After prison, my father came to America, joined the Army, fought in Vietnam -- and was exposed to Agent Orange. He died a slow, horrible death. Music was my escape.”

Gloria Estefan (1957) Cuban-American singer-songwriter, actress and divorciada

www.huffingtonpost.com (September 7, 2007)
2007, 2008

Life , Death , Age , Music

“Lock her up, that's right. Yeah, that's right, lock her up! I'm going to tell you what, it's unbelievable, it's unbelievable. If I did a tenth, a tenth, of what she did, I would be in jail today.”

Michael T. Flynn (1958) 25th United States National Security Advisor

Speaking at the Republican National Convention https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx94428MYcc (18 July 2016)
Public Statements

“My mom said 'you are either going to be in jail, or be killed'. So I decided to do something different because I didn't want to be in one of those positions, so I kind of focused on football and took off from there.”

Vince Young (1983) American college football player, professional football player, quarterback

On the "negative things" that were going on when he was growing up.

Moms , Football

“Happily for us, students have not tried to overthrow the Government of the United States, but they certainly are making their views felt in public affairs. I think especially of the participation of American students in the great struggle to advance civil and human rights in America. Indeed, even a jail sentence is no longer a dishonor but a proud achievement.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

Commencement address at Colby College, Waterville, Maine (June 7, 1964), reported in The Papers of Adlai E. Stevenson (1979), vol. 8, p. 567

Thinking

“Given the way these mutants treat women in their societies, the women are probably better off in U. S. custody. They treat women like furniture in those countries. If I was a woman, I think I’d rather be in an American jail cell than I would be living with one of those-whatever they are over there.”

Jack Cafferty (1942) American journalist

On the subject of terrorist demands for the release of two female scientists from an Iraqi prison, September 23, 2004.
[American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Jack Cafferty In His Own Words, 18 November 2004, http://www.adc.org/index.php?id=2386]
2004

Women , Way , Thinking , Country

“Was it appropriate to jail the guys from Enron? … Was it appropriate to jail people from the cigarette industry who insisted that this addictive product was not addictive, and so on? … In these cases, for me, as a taxpayer and voter, the introduction of this extreme doubt about climate change is affecting my quality of life as a public citizen. … That there is a chilling effect on scientists who are in extreme doubt about climate change, I think that is good.”

Bill Nye (1955) American science educator, comedian, television host, actor, writer, scientist and former mechanical engineer

Bill Nye, "Science Guy," Open to Jail Time for Climate Change Skeptics http://reason.com/blog/2016/04/15/bill-nye-science-guy-open-to-jail-time-f in Reason.com (15 April 2016)

Life , People , Guy , Thinking

“Morsy was not only Egypt's democratically elected president, he is now emerging as the Arab world's Nelson Mandela…during Morsy's one-year reign, Egypt enjoyed freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate peacefully, and not a single one of his political opponents were jailed.”

Tawakkol Karman (1979) Yemeni journalist, politician, human rights activist, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

2010s, Morsy is the Arab World's Mandela (2013)

World , Freedom

“There was one form of concerted action that Tolstoy believed advisable and he asked the workers to refrain religiously, firstly, from working for capitalists, if they could possibly get on without it; secondly, from offering their work at a lower rate than that current; thirdly, from improving their position by passing over to the side of the capitalists and serving their interests; and fourthly and chiefly, from participating in governmental coercion, be it police, customhouse, or military service. Only by such "a religious attitude toward the form of their activity" can the workmen liberate themselves from oppression. …a bloodless revolution that would be carried into effect through passive resistance. The workers are simply to refrain from doing anything that will add to the wealth or power of those who now dominate their lives. …All the people cannot be shot down or imprisoned and if all the people were willing to do as Thoreau did—go to jail rather than pay taxes, government itself would disappear.”

Robert Hunter (author) (1874–1942) American sociologist, author, golf course architect

Source: Why We Fail as Christians (1919), p. 72-73

People , Wealth

“I love that program (asset forfeiture). We had so much fun doing that, taking drug dealers' money and passing it out to people trying to put drug dealers in jail. What's wrong with that?”

Jeff Sessions (1946) Former United States Attorney General

Sessions welcomes restoration of asset forfeiture: "I love that program" https://www.cbsnews.com/news/sessions-welcomes-expansion-of-asset-forfeiture-i-love-that-program/, September 1 2017

Love , Money , People

“You see a Party system that crushes down anybody who [has] different opinions, who has different ideas in their mind. Simply to have different opinions can cost someone their life. They can be put in jail, they can be silenced, and they can [disappear]. And the other people would take it, not giving support.”

Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist

2010-, Ai Weiwei, interview by Christiane Amanpour, 2010

Life , People , Idea , Support

“Despite strikes and riots all over the country, bloodily put down by the Minute Men, Windrip's power in Washington was maintained. The most liberal four members of the Supreme Court resigned and were replaced by surprisingly unknown lawyers who called President Windrip by his first name. A number of Congressmen were still being "protected" in the District of Columbia jail; others had seen the blinding light forever shed by the goddess Reason and happily returned to the Capitol. The Minute Men were increasingly loyal—they were still unpaid volunteers, but provided with "expense accounts" considerably larger than the pay of the regular troops. Never in American history had the adherents of a President been so well satisfied; they were not only appointed to whatever political jobs there were but to ever so many that really were not; and with such annoyances as Congressional Investigations hushed, the official awarders of contracts were on the merriest of terms with all contractors.... One veteran lobbyist for steel corporations complained that there was no more sport in his hunting—you were not only allowed but expected to shoot all government purchasing-agents sitting.”

Sinclair Lewis book It Can't Happen Here

It Can't Happen Here (1935)

Men , History , Sport , Light

“Every tiny molecule of Ash is in motion with my heat
I am such a Lunatic that I am free even in Jail.”

Bhagat Singh (1907–1931) Indian revolutionary

Jail Note Book of Shahid Bhagat Singh (1929) http://www.scribd.com/doc/9728510/Jail-Note-Book-of-Shahid-Bhagat-Singh

“Militant Muslims want Islam and sharia law to dominate the West. Their goal is to subvert the U. S. Constitution and our way of life to the will of Allah. The word Islam means submission. What members of the American Left seem blind to is the fact that in countries where Islam dominates, their progressive ideas would be crushed and many of them would be thrown in jail simply because of their lifestyle choices. Yet, the American Left continues to serve as apologist-in-chief for fundamentalist Islam. Why? Because deep down American Leftists are terrified of Islamic fundamentali”

Chuck Hustmyre (1963) American journalist

2000s, 2009, The Left's love affair with Islam (2009)

Life , Law , Way , Idea

“I may not be able to say all I think; but I am not going to say anything that I do not think. I would rather a thousand times be a free soul in jail than to be a sycophant and coward in the streets.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

The Canton, Ohio Speech, Anti-War Speech (1918)

Soul , Thinking , Time

“We handed the most important belongings of our people -- the railroads and the banks -- to aliens who 2000 years ago had turned the temple into a house of usury. Back then there was a man who had the bravery to drive out these scoundrels with a whip! If today a national socialist is seen with such a temple-whip, he's thrown into jail.”

Julius Streicher (1885–1946) German politician

Wir haben unsere wichtigsten Volksgüter, die Eisenbahnen und die Banken, den Fremdlingen überlassen, die schon vor 2000 Jahren den Tempel zu einem Wucherhaus gemacht haben. Damals hatte schon einer den Mut besessen, mit einer Peitsche dieses Gesindel auszutreiben! Wenn heute ein Nationalsozialist mit einer solchen Tempelpeitsche angetroffen wird, wird er ins Gefängnis geworfen.
05/01/1925, speech in the Bavarian regional parliament; debate about the budget of the ministry of justice ("Kampf dem Weltfeind", Stürmer publishing house, Nuremberg, 1938)

People , Housing