Court Quotes

500+ Sourced quotes

I want to be a good person, to have a strong will but not be inflexible; to court joy; to develop humor and loyalty and patience; to learn to say less when no words improve the situation.

You will not find a surgeon operating you quite likable. You find a doctor trying to convince you that you are in a great shape, that you do not need an operation that you will get better by drinking teas, much more amiable. I want people to respect my work, not to like me. My goal is to have the Serbian government evaluated for what it benefited for this country using existing chances and own efforts and potentials, rather than by its smooth talk, paying court to the people and talking about its good intentions.

Zoran Đinđić

The point at which life becomes 'worthless,' and the point at which the means necessary to preserve it become 'extraordinary' or 'inappropriate,' are neither set forth in the Constitution nor known to the nine Justices of this Court any better than they are known to nine people picked at random from the Kansas City telephone directory...[therefore] even when it is demonstrated by clear and convincing evidence that a patient no longer wishes certain measures to be taken to preserve her life, it is up to the citizens of Missouri to decide, through their elected representatives, whether that wish will be honored.

Chutzpa is that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court as an orphan.

Whatever is contrary, bonos mores est decorum, the principles of our law prohibit, and the King's Court, as the general censor and guardian of the public manners, is bound to restrain and punish.

William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield

Knowing more about the public effects his work will have, the engineer ought to consider himself an "officer of the court" and keep the general interest always in mind.

Hyman G. Rickover

At common law, the Attorney-General is, when he is exercising his functions as an officer of the Crown, in no case that I know of a Court in the ordinary sense.

Charles Bowen, Baron Bowen

It was my hope that this localized situation would be brought under control by city and State authorities. If the use of local police powers had been sufficient, our traditional method of leaving the problems in those hands would have been pursued. But when large gatherings of obstructionists made it impossible for the decrees of the Court to be carried out, both the law and the national interest demanded that the President take action.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

During the earlier years of the League we were fortunate in having many statesmen of outstanding ability who were convinced supporters of international cooperation under the League Covenant. … It is enough to say that under the leadership of those great men the first ten years of the League of Nations was a period of almost unbroken prosperity. The League moved from strength to strength. It established its organization and its Secretariat — a very remarkable achievement which has worked extremely well. Then, too, came the Permanent Court of International Justice, which has also been a very marked success and which, I trust, will establish ultimately the rule of law in all international affairs.

Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood

'The operation was a success, but the patient died.' What such a procedure is to medicine, the Court's opinion in this case is to law.

The audience is the controlling factor in the actor's life. It is practically infallible, since there is no appeal from its verdict. It is a little like a supreme court composed of irresponsible minors.

He was a man
Who stole the livery of the court of Heaven
To serve the Devil in.

In reference to prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay:

Eventually, these people will have trials and they will have counsel and they will be represented in a court of law.

To be honest, I haven't felt at my best since this tournament began. I didn't feel good with the court or the balls. But those are excuses. You have to accept when you don't play well and somebody else does.

For a century every contest with the Supreme Court has ended in evading the basic inconsistency between popular government and judicial supremacy.

Robert H. Jackson

The sad truth is that truth is almost irrelevant in a court of law.

Is the Minister aware that many people regard the present system of juryless trials at the Crumlin road court as outrageous? It would be appropriate for him to pay a visit to see the way in which trials take place, with no jury, where the decision is made solely on the word of a supergrass witness who stands to benefit from giving evidence, and where only the judge makes the decision. How much money has been paid in the last four years to supergrass witnesses for their evidence in such circumstances?

"Was anyone hurt?"
"No one I am thankful to say," said Mrs. Beaver, "except two housemaids who lost their heads and jumped through a glass roof into the paved court."

I do not know whether it is the view of the Court that a judge must be thick-skinned or just thick-headed, but nothing in my experience or observation confirms the idea that he is insensitive to publicity. Who does not prefer good to ill report of his work? And if fame — a good public name — is, as Milton said, the "last infirmity of noble mind", it is frequently the first infirmity of a mediocre one.

Robert H. Jackson

A deliberate and determined effort is being made to break down the guarantees of our fundamental law. It has for its purpose the confiscation of property and the destruction of liberty. At the present time the chief obstacle to this effort is the Supreme Court of the United States. In this contest there is but one place for a real American to stand. That is on the side of ordered liberty under constitutional government. This is not the struggle of the rich and powerful. They will be able to survive. It is the struggle of the common run of people. Unless we can maintain our institutions of liberty unimpaired they will see their savings swept away, their homes devastated, and their children perish from want and hunger.

Calvin Coolidge

The full comedy of the situation was revealed in 1900, when, nearly a century after France and Germany had laid the foundations of a public system of secondary education, the Court of Appeal virtually decided that there was no Public Authority in England with legal power to establish and maintain secondary schools.

So many able writers have shown that the unjust institutions which work so much misery and suffering to the masses have their root in governments, and owe their whole existence to the power derived from government. We cannot help but believe that were every law, every title deed, every court, and every police officer or soldier abolished tomorrow with one sweep, we would be better off than now.

Everyone in the band wore their influences on their sleeves and there was not a bit of the typical L. A. vibe going on where the goal is to court a record deal. There was no concern for the proper poses or goofy choruses that might spell pop-chart success; which ultimately guaranteed endless hot chicks. That type of calculated rebellion wasn't an option for us; we were too rabid a pack of musically like-minded gutter rats. We were passionate, with a common goal and a very distinct sense of integrity. That was the difference between us and them.

The best of Welshmen, valiant man,
Lord of the land, of Pywer Llew's line,
A slim strong man, to him the court belongs,
That best of places, worthy to be praised.

The Court's great power is its ability to educate, to provide moral leadership.

William O. Douglas