Quote

It is the daily it is the small it is the cumulative injuries of little people that we are here to protect....If we are able to keep our democracy, there must be once commandment: THOU SHALT NOT RATION JUSTICE.

Learned Hand

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Learned Hand
Age: 89 †
Born: 1872
Born: January 27
Died: 1961
Died: August 18
Judge
Lawyer
Philosopher
Albany
New York
Billings Learned Hand
Able
Thou
Ration
Little
Daily
Rations
Must
Protect
Commandment
People
Democracy
Cumulative
Justice
Injuries
Small
Shalt
Keep
Commandments
Littles
Injury

More quotes by Learned Hand

Image
It is still in the lap of the gods whether a society can succeed which is based on civil liberties and human rights conceived as I have tried to describe them but of one thing at least we may be sure: the alternatives that have so far appeared have been immeasurably worse.
Learned Hand
Image
The spirit of liberty is the spirit that is not quite sure it is right.
Learned Hand
Image
The profession of the law of which he [a judge] is a part is charged with the articulation and final incidence of the successive efforts towards justice it must feel the circulation of the communal blood or it will wither and drop off, a useless member.
Learned Hand
Image
Words are not pebbles in alien juxtaposition.
Learned Hand
Image
Liberty is so much latitude as the powerful choose to accord to the weak.
Learned Hand
Image
It is of course true that any kind of judicial legislation is objectionable on the score of the limited interests which a Court can represent, yet there are wrongs which in fact legislatures cannot be brought to take an interest in, at least not until the Courts have acted.
Learned Hand
Image
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
Image
As soon as we cease to pry about at random, we shall come to rely upon accredited bodies of authoritative dogma and as soon as we come to rely upon accredited bodies of authoritative dogma, not only are the days of our liberty over, but we have lost the password that has hitherto opened to us the gates of success as well.
Learned Hand
Image
Seldom, if ever, does wisdom come, shall we punish it if it comes late?
Learned Hand
Image
It was not the violence of our enemies [in World War I] that would undo us, I thought, but our own spiritual weakness, the shallowness of our convictions.
Learned Hand
Image
The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understands the minds of other men and women.
Learned Hand
Image
The apathy of the modern voter is the confusion of the modern reformer.
Learned Hand
Image
Life is not a thing of knowing only--nay, mere knowledge has properly no place at all save as it becomes the handmaiden of feeling and emotions.
Learned Hand
Image
The lawyer must either learn to live more capaciously or be content to find himself continuously less trusted, more circumscribed, till he becomes hardly more important than a minor administrator, confined to a monotonous round of record and routine, without dignity, inspiration, or respect.
Learned Hand
Image
In the end it is worse to suppress dissent than to run the risk of heresy.
Learned Hand
Image
We recently had a referendum in New York about extending the forest preserve. The city voted for it by a large majority yet as I walk the streets I do not see afforestation written with conviction on the harried faces of my fellow citizens.
Learned Hand
Image
A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few.
Learned Hand
Image
If we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: thou shalt not ration justice.
Learned Hand
Image
You cannot raise the standard against oppression, or leap into the breach to relieve injustice, and still keep an open mind to every disconcerting fact, or an open ear to the cold voice of doubt.
Learned Hand
Image
The language of the law must not be foreign to the ears of those who are to obey it.
Learned Hand