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It is better that ten guilty persons escape than one innocent suffer.

William Blackstone

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William Blackstone
Age: 56 †
Born: 1723
Born: July 10
Died: 1780
Died: February 14
Barrister
Judge
Jurist
Politician
University Teacher
Writer
the City
Sir William Blackstone
Guilty
Innocent
Suffer
Ten
Justice
Fairness
Suffering
Innocence
Persons
Escape
Better
Ethics

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No outward doors of a man's house can in general be broken open to execute any civil process though in criminal cases the public safety supersedes the private.
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Every wanton and causeless restraint of the will of the subject, whether practiced by a monarch, a nobility, or a popular assembly, is a degree of tyranny.
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No enactment of man can be considered law unless it conforms to the law of God
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The most universal and effectual way of discovering the true meaning of law, when the words are dubious, is by considering the reason and spirit of it or the cause which moved the legislator to enact it. for when this reason ceased, the law itself ought likewise to cease with it.
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By marriage the husband and wife are one person in law, that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during marriage.
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Man must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator. This will of his Maker is called the Law of Nature. This Law of Nature is superior to any other. No human laws are of any validity if contrary to this.
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In all tyrannical governments the supreme magistracy, or the right both of making and of enforcing the laws, is vested in one and the same man, or one and the same body of men and wherever these two powers are united together, there can be no public liberty.
William Blackstone
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The third absolute right, inherent in every Englishman, is that of . . . the sacred and inviolable rights of private property.
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The law rarely hesitates in declaring its own meaning but the Judges are frequently puzzled to find out the meaning of others.
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Free men have arms slaves do not.
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The husband and wife are one, and that one is the husband.
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Gaming is a kind of tacit confession that the company engaged therein do in general exceed the bounds of their respective fortunes, and therefore they cast lots to determine upon whom the ruin shall at present fall, that the rest may be saved a little longer.
William Blackstone
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Time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.
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There is nothing which so generally strikes the imagination and engages the affections of mankind, as the right of property.
William Blackstone
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The sciences are of a sociable disposition, and flourish best in the neighborhood of each other nor is there any branch of learning but may be helped and improved by assistance drawn from other arts.
William Blackstone
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Trial by jury is a privilege of the highest and most beneficial nature [and] our most important guardian both of public and private liberty. The liberties of England cannot but subsist so long as this palladium remains sacred and inviolate, not only from all open attacks, ... but also from all secret machinations, which may sap and undermine it.
William Blackstone
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Man..must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being..And, consequently, as man depends absolutely upon his Maker for everything, it is necessary that he should in all points conform to his Maker's will.
William Blackstone
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The public good is in nothing more essentially interested, than in the protection of every individual's private rights.
William Blackstone
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Punishments of unreasonable severity, especially where indiscriminately afflicted, have less effect in preventing crimes, and amending the manners of a people, than such as are more merciful in general, yet properly intermixed with due distinctions of severity.
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Herein indeed consists the excellence of the English government, that all parts of it form a mutual check upon each other.
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