20th-century Lawyer Quotes

Regimes collapse when people are no longer afraid and think they're no longer alone.

Gordon G. Chang

I won't be running for office again. But I'll continue to advocate, write and teach.

It is not fair to Tony or to the Government that the entire focus of political debate at the moment is about me. I know I'm in a very special position, I'm the wife of the Prime Minister, I have an interesting job and a wonderful family, but I also know I am not Superwoman. The reality of my daily life is that I'm juggling a lot of balls in the air. Some of you must experience that.

America. America. Land of my birth and erstwhile distiess. Hypocrite immemorial. My heart left long ago. At long last, I have followed it. Trying my very best, how could I, in good conscience, remain for a countiy that has never ever, at home or abroad, been for me or for mine?

Randall Robinson

Whereas in England all is permitted that is not expressly prohibited, it has been said that in Germany all is prohibited unless expressly permitted and in France all is permitted that is expressly prohibited. In the European Common Market (as it then was) no-one knows what is permitted and it all costs more.

I think the top leadership challenge issue in our world today is how to deal with the continuing, growing population in the world and all the resource demands it places on the world and burgeoning populations in Africa and Asia that lack the resources to have a healthy, happy life.

I am proud of what I have accomplished, especially while serving as chief justice, at the time I joined the court, it was marked by acrimony. When I became chief justice, we proved that good people who may differ in their opinions can come together and accomplish important things for the people we serve – and we do it amicably.

Robert P. Young Jr.

My dear, erase the word discouragement from your dictionary and your mind; it isn't worthy of a woman who hopes to be a nurse; never let me hear you say it again.

Alice S. Fisher

A lawyer's either a social engineer or he's a parasite on society.

Charles Hamilton Houston

Law is not a mausoleum. It is not an antique to be taken down, dusted, admired and put back on the shelf. It is like an old but vigorous tree, having roots in history, yet continuously taking new grafts and putting out new sprouts and occasionally dropping dead wood. It is essentially a social process, the end product of which is justice and hence it must change with changing social values. Otherwise there will be estrangement between law and justice and law will cease to have legitimacy.

Your melancholy. Or depression. Along with nine-tenths of the afflictions I've studied, diagnosed, attempted to treat. Call them whatever you like, but they're just different names for loneliness. That's what lets the darkness in. That's what you have to fight.

Deserts are where mountains go when they die.

I don't ask employers, for example, to like blacks or Jews or native people; I ask employers to hire the qualified members of thesegroups whether they likethem or not.

Couples counseling gets many couples back together. But not all, and not always. For your own sake and that of your children, however, I recommend it - I almost insist on it - as the first step for anyone unhappy in a relationship.

Calls for equal treatment are often seen as calls for 'special treatment' in situations where discrimination has become the norm.

I am deeply grateful and honored for the opportunity to serve my country. I thank the President and his staff for their confidence in me and I am eager to work tirelessly on behalf of the American worker

Alexander Acosta

The world is my country, the human race is my race. The spirit of man is my god, the future of man is my heaven.

We are all broken by something. We have all hurt someone and have been hurt. We all share the condition of brokenness even if our brokenness is not equivalent.

Bryan Stevenson

I never looked for anybody to hold the door open for me. I knew well that the only way I could get that door open was to knock it down: because I knocked all of them down.

Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander

If you get one good doctor, you get one good thing, but if you get one bad doctor, you get one bad thing. If you have a lawsuit, you get a bad lawyer, you lose your suit — you can appeal; but if you have one bad doctor, and he kills you, then there can be no appeal.

Nicholas Katzenbach

History is the heritage and patrimony of mankind in its lessons of the past that give priceless inspiration for the future.

I don't want to know what the law is, I want to know who the judge is.

In five years, you're going to be blown away by the strength and diversity of Michigan's transformed economy.

Jennifer Granholm

This country is going so far to the right you won't recognize it.

John N. Mitchell

In the mind of Bill Clinton, political considerations outweigh even life-and-death matters of great concern to his own law-enforcement officials, not to mention the nation.