It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.
—Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–68) American Civil Rights Leader, Clergyman
As to lawyers, their profession is supported by the indiscriminate defense of right and wrong.
—Junius Unidentified English Writer
All that makes existence valuable to any one depends on the enforcement of restraints upon the actions of other people.
—John Stuart Mill (1806–73) English Philosopher, Economist
A priest sees people at their best, a lawyer at their worst, but a doctor sees them as they really are.
—Common Proverb
The good lawyer knows the law; the clever one knows the judge.
—U.S. Proverb
Lawyers spend a great deal of their time shoveling smoke.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
Lawyers, I suppose, were children once.
—Charles Lamb (1775–1834) British Essayist, Poet
Our demands are simple, normal, and therefore they are difficult to satisfy. All we ask is that an actor on the stage live in accordance with natural laws
—Constantin Stanislavski (1863–1938) Russian Actor, Theater Personality
The kind of lawyer you hope the other fellow has.
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) American Novelist
He is no lawyer who cannot take two sides.
—Charles Lamb (1775–1834) British Essayist, Poet
Whatever the human law may be, neither an individual nor a nation can commit the least act of injustice against the obscurest individual without having to pay the penalty for it.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
A lawyer’s dream of Heaven: Every man reclaimed his own property at the resurrection, and each tried to recover it from all his forefathers.
—Samuel Butler
Where the law is uncertain there is no law.
—Common Proverb
Fools and obstinate men make lawyers rich.
—Common Proverb
The graveyards are full of young lawyers, lost inheritance and young doctors.
—French Proverb
Laws, like houses, lean on one another.
—Edmund Burke (1729–97) British Philosopher, Statesman
The law was made for one thing alone, for the exploitation of those who don’t understand it, or are prevented by naked misery from obeying it.
—Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German Poet, Playwright, Theater Personality
Keep out of Chancery. It’s being ground to bits in a slow mill; it’s being roasted at a slow fire; it’s being stung to death by single bees; it’s being drowned by drops; it’s going mad by grains.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can … As a peace-maker the lawyer has a superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Law and equity are two things that God hath joined together, but which man has put asunder.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
Divorce is a game played by lawyers.
—Cary Grant (1904–86) British-American Film Actor
In the habits of legal men every accusation appears insufficient if they do not exaggerate it even to calumny. It is thus that justice itself loses its sanctity and its respect among men.
—Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869) French Poet, Politician, Historian
God wanted to chastise mankind, so he sent lawyers
—Russian Proverb
Lawyer, n. One skilled in circumvention of the law.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
A country survives its legislation. That truth should not comfort the conservative nor depress the radical. For it means that public policy can enlarge its scope and increase its audacity, can try big experiments without trembling too much over the result. This nation could enter upon the most radical experiments and could afford to fail in them.
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974) American Journalist, Political Commentator, Writer
If the laws could speak for themselves, they would complain of the lawyers.
—E. F. L. Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax (1881–1959) British Politician, Political leader
I have spent all my life under a Communist regime, and I will tell you that a society without any objective legal scale is a terrible one indeed. But a society with no other scale but the legal one is not quite worthy of man either.
—Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Russian Dissident Novelist
Even an attorney of moderate talent can postpone doomsday year after year, for the system of appeals that pervades American jurisprudence amounts to a legalistic wheel of fortune, a game of chance, somewhat fixed in the favor of the criminal, that the participants play interminably.
—Truman Capote (1924–84) American Novelist
[A] lawyer without books would be like a workman without tools.
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) American Head of State, Lawyer
Lawyers on opposite sides of a case are like the two parts of shears; they cut what comes between them, but not each other.
—Daniel Webster (1782–1852) American Statesman, Lawyer
Lawyers know life practically. A bookish man should always have them to converse with.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
The severity of the laws prevents their execution.
—Montesquieu (1689–1755) French Political Philosopher, Jurist
Only lawyers and painters can turn white to black.
—Japanese Proverb
I sometimes wish that people would put a little more emphasis on the observance of the law than they do upon its enforcement.
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American Head of State, Lawyer
A lawyer without history or literature is a mechanic, a mere working mason; if he possesses some knowledge of these, he may venture to call himself an architect.
—Walter Scott (1771–1832) Scottish Novelist, Poet, Playwright, Lawyer
To some lawyers, all facts are created equal.
—Felix Frankfurter (1882–1965) American Judge
Every law is an infraction of liberty.
—Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) British Philosopher, Economist
In cross examination, as in fishing, nothing is more ungainly than a fisherman pulled into the water by his catch.
—Louis Nizer (1902–1994) American Lawyer, Author
In a state where corruption abounds, laws must be very numerous.
—Tacitus (56–117) Roman Orator, Historian
The only laws of matter are those that our minds must fabricate and the only laws of mind are fabricated for it by matter.
—James Clerk Maxwell (1831–1879) Scottish Mathematician, Physicist
People are getting smarter nowadays; they are letting lawyers, instead of their conscience, be their guide.
—Will Rogers (1879–1935) American Actor, Rancher, Humorist
Only Lawyers and mental defectives are automatically exempt for jury duty.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Curse on all laws, but those that love has made.
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744) English Poet
The law isn’t justice. It’s a very imperfect mechanism. If you press exactly the right buttons and are also lucky, justice may show up in the answer. A mechanism is all the law was ever intended to be.
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) American Novelist
Adversaries in law strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
The laws and the stage, both are a form of exhibitionism.
—Orson Welles (1915–85) American Film Director, Actor
Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
A lawsuit is a fruit-tree planted in a lawyer’s garden.
—Italian Proverb
When men are pure, laws are useless; when men are corrupt, laws are broken.
—Benjamin Disraeli (1804–81) British Head of State
No civilization would ever have been possible without a framework of stability, to provide the wherein for the flux of change. Foremost among the stabilizing factors, more enduring than customs, manners and traditions, are the legal systems that regulate our life in the world and our daily affairs with each other.
—Hannah Arendt (1906–75) German-American Philosopher, Political Theorist