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I think most defense attorneys honestly believe the principle that says, 'Better 10 guilty go free than even one possibly innocent person be convicted.

Alan Dershowitz

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Alan Dershowitz
Age: 86
Born: 1938
Born: September 1
Lawyer
Screenwriter
University Teacher
Brooklyn
New York
Alan M. Dershowitz
Alan Morton Dershowitz
Better
Principle
Even
Honestly
Believe
Defense
Attorneys
Think
Principles
Convicted
Thinking
Says
Attorney
Free
Possibly
Persons
Guilty
Person
Innocent

More quotes by Alan Dershowitz

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Doing something because God has said to do it does not make a person moral: it merely tells us that person is a prudential believer, akin to the person who obeys the command of an all-powerful secular king.
Alan Dershowitz
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Well, many insane people and seriously mentally ill people seem very reasonable.
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Individuals have the right to pick and choose which expressions to condemn, which to praise and which to say nothing about. Governments, however, must remain neutral as to the content of expression. And governments must protect the rights of all to express even the most despicable of views.
Alan Dershowitz
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Laws are important precisely because in a democracy they reflect the attitudes and aspirations of those they govern.
Alan Dershowitz
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I don't believe in firing professors. They have academic freedom.
Alan Dershowitz
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The law is agnostic about truth. It's very skeptical of ultimate truth. That's why freedom of speech permits lies to be told.
Alan Dershowitz
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I have no doubt that if an actual ticking bomb situation were to arise, our law enforcement authorities would torture. The real debate is whether such torture should take place outside of our legal system or within it. The answer to this seems clear: If we are to have torture, it should be authorized by the law.
Alan Dershowitz
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I was critical of race-based affirmative action early on in my career and I've changed my mind. And I've publicly acknowledged that I was wrong.
Alan Dershowitz
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The vast majority of gun owners don't kill, but people who do kill, tend to kill with guns, and often with illegal guns.
Alan Dershowitz
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Imagine a legal system in which lawyers were equated with the clients they defended and were condemned for representing controversial or despised clients.
Alan Dershowitz
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I think that lawyers are terrible at admitting that they're wrong. And not just admitting it also realizing it. Most lawyers are very successful, and they think that because they're making money and people think well of them, they must be doing everything right.
Alan Dershowitz
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I think we're seeing privacy diminish, not by laws... but by young people who don't seem to value their privacy.
Alan Dershowitz
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The first rule for escaping prison in the United States is always having someone more important than yourself to incriminate.
Alan Dershowitz
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We don't have an Official Secrets Act in the United States, as other countries do. Under the First Amendment, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and freedom of association are more important than protecting secrets.
Alan Dershowitz
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I never place limits on the potential success of my students. If they're going into acting, they're going to win the Oscar... If they're going into law, they're going to be chief justice.
Alan Dershowitz
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On television and in the movies, crimes are always solved. Nothing is left uncertain. By the end, the viewer knows whodunit. In real life, on the other hand, many murders remain unsolved, and even some that are solved to the satisfaction of the police and prosecutors lack sufficient evidence to result in a conviction.
Alan Dershowitz
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Candor and accountability in a democracy is very important. Hypocrisy has no place.
Alan Dershowitz
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The judge also has a truth he wants to hide: He often hasn't been completely candid in describing the facts or the law.
Alan Dershowitz
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I have always considered Pascal's Wager a questionable bet to place. Any God worth believing in would surely prefer an honest agnostic to a calculating hypocrite.
Alan Dershowitz
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I read in the newspaper that the Catholic Church finally decided that it had been theologically improper to try to convert the Jews. Whoops! Sorry for all those inquisitions, crusades, and autos-da-fe. Previous popes were wrong - infallible, perhaps, but wrong.
Alan Dershowitz