20th-century Judge Quotes

Antonin Scalia

Neil Gorsuch

Earl Warren

Clarence Thomas

Sandra Day O'Connor

Thurgood Marshall

William Rehnquist

Mother brings a child late to contact by half-an-hour; father then requires an extra half-hour the next week. This is getting silly. If, in fact, the father does not see the child at all, of course he should see the child on another occasion, but there are fathers who actually add up the minutes and produce it and say "Now I should have so much more contact because I lost five minutes last week and ten minutes the week before".

Elizabeth Butler-Sloss

It is easy to imagine how a young, protected child who sees portrayals of brutality is forever scarred and becomes determined to contribute in her own small way to social justice.

There is one kind of judge. There is an independent judge under our Constitution. And the fact that they may have been a Republican or Democrat or an independent in a past life is completely irrelevant to how they conduct themselves as judges. And I think two centuries of experience has shown us that that ideal which the Founders established can be realized and has been realized and will continue to be realized.

Brett Kavanaugh

I think that the best judges are the ones that seek to apply precedent in good faith. I think most judges do that. But that is something that has to be done in good faith without skewing the precedent one way or the other. At the same time, there has to be a respect for the work of the district courts and not take an ivory tower approach to the review of what happens there. Those judges are the ones that see the people before them. They see the witnesses.

Raymond Kethledge

The proponents of a mandatory retirement age and term limits have underestimated the degree to which the rational actor model applies to Justices. In making many decisions, as the empirical evidence demonstrates, Justices attempt to maximize their own preferences, whether based on policy considerations or other factors. The retirement decision is no exception. Scholars who dispute the applicability of the rational actor model to Justices have either not focused on the persuasive empirical evidence advanced by political scientists or have failed to consider all of the variables that touch upon judicial utility.

In some of our subcultures, paper bags are often used to carry intimate personal belongings. And the sight of some of our less fortunate citizens carrying their belongings in brown paper bags is too familiar to permit such crass biases to diminish protection of privacy.

David L. Bazelon

Judges should always behave judicially by adjudicating, never politically by legislating. I leave policy to policymakers. They're preeminent, but they're not omnipotent. In other words, lawmakers decide if laws pass, but judges decide if laws pass muster. There's a fateful difference between activist judges who concoct rights and active judges who dutifully protect the rights our Framers actually enshrined.

Imagine my surprise one day in February 1951 to read in the newspaper that John J. McCloy, the high commissioner to Germany, had restored all the Krupp properties that had been ordered confiscated.

William J. Wilkins (Washington state judge)

Would you approve of your young sons, young daughters – because girls can read as well as boys – reading this book? Is it a book that you would have lying around in your own house? Is it a book that you would even wish your wife or your servants to read?

Mervyn Griffith-Jones

This contract is so one-sided that I am surprised to find it written on both sides of the paper.

Raymond Evershed, 1st Baron Evershed

The Court is perhaps one of the last citadels of jealously preserved individualism. For the most part, we function as nine, small independent law firms.

Lewis F. Powell, Jr.

What is it about the government and its agents and employees that they can lie to us with impunity, but we risk being sent to jail if we lie to them?

Andrew Napolitano

Advanced planning is another area which the private sector has excelled, but not government. However, today's changing market conditions, increasing demands, shrinking budgets and even globalization force us to look at the way we provide our judicial services in a different light. It is no longer enough that we do our job, we now have to do it with a greater sense of purpose and accountability every step of the way.

Federico Hernández Denton

It is the virtue of God, the Parmatma, the creator to do justice and we as judges merely act as his agents. I always seek guidance from the creator so that we do not make a wrong judgment. We act without favour or fear, ill will or affection. For me it makes no difference.

Rana Bhagwandas

Deep down I've always known fly-fishing is to the rest of fishing what high seduction is to rape.

John D. Voelker

If you have never experienced life under a microscope, you need to understand that those who live a public life no longer are seen as 'real persons' — human beings. Rather they are objects to be examined, manipulated, ridiculed.

The UK can be proud of its real contribution to this unique system and its influence in bringing about effective human rights protection throughout the European continent. It would be deeply regrettable if it were to allow its commitment to that system to be called into question by a failure to defend it against its detractors or to offer its strong support for the vital work of the court.

Definition is ordinarily supposed to produce clarity in thinking. It is not generally recognized that the more we define our terms the less descriptive they become and the more difficulty we have in using them.

Like an usher in a dark movie theater, holding the client by the hand, the lawyer guides him through the maze of law and regulation which now enmeshes all our lives.

Simon H. Rifkind

The independence of the (legal) profession also ensures that it can take an objective view on issues concerning not only these matters, but also those of wider public concern. In fact, it can only discharge this responsibility to be independent and objective, if it is perceived by society at large to be independent.

Governments always tend to want not really a free press but a managed or well-conducted one.

The First Amendment, I think, is the jewel of our Constitution.

This is not the first time I've charged a person before I've made the case.

The burden of Karma is heavy. All alike have heavy debts to pay. Yet none, so the Wisdom teaches, is ever faced with more than he can bear. Whether or not we can grin, we must bear it, and it is folly to attempt to run away.

Christmas Humphreys

For the purposes of our Inquiry the concept of institutional racism which we apply consists of: The collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin.

William Macpherson (judge)