Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes

Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty.

What is going to rule our great commonwealth, the mob or the law?

Law and freedom must be indivisible partners. For without law, there can be no freedom, only choas and disorder; and without freedom, law is but a cynical veneer for injustice and oppression.

The good society is marked by a high degree of order, justice, and freedom. Among these, order has primacy: for justice cannot be enforced until a tolerable civil social order is attained, nor can freedom be anything better than violence until order gives us laws.

Liberty plucks justice by the nose; The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart Goes all decorum.

Law is justice. And it is under the law of justice - under the reign of right; under the influence of liberty, safety, stability, and responsibility - that every person will attain his real worth and the true dignity of his being. It is only under this law of justice that mankind will achieve - slowly, no doubt, but certainly - God's design for the orderly and peaceful progress of humanity.

Money can buy the necessary police order. Justice is sold to the highest bidder

Our defense is not in our armaments, nor in science, nor in going underground. Our defense is in law and order.

Lynch mobs are democracies.

Justice is merely incidental to law and order. Law and order is what covers the whole picture. Justice is part of it, but it can't be separated as a single thing.

The first requisite of civilization, therefore, is that of justice — that is, the assurance that a law once made will not be broken in favour of an individual. This implies nothing as to the ethical value of such a law.

Justice wields an erratic sword, grants mercy to fortunate few. Yet if man doesn't fight for her, 'tis chaos he's left to.

This idea that America is somehow on the verge of collapse, this vision of violence and chaos everywhere, doesn't really jibe with the experience of most people.

Let us have justice, and then we shall have enough liberty!

Most people live uncomplicated lives. They have work and quietly rear their children. There is an order and sanity about them that keeps the world going. There is an outer disorder and insanity about my life which makes me a victim. One of the disorders is that they won't give us citizenship here.

Obviously I prefer freedom, but I know, and I think all history has told us, that freedom cannot flow from anarchy and disorder.

Where the law of the majority ceases to be acknowledged, there government ends; the law of the strongest takes its place, and life and property are his who can take them.

No legal plunder: This is the principle of justice, peace, order, stability, harmony, and logic. Until the day of my death, I shall proclaim this principle with all the force of my lungs (which alas! is all too inadequate).

The essential function of the State is to maintain peace, justice, law, and order, and to protect the individual citizen against aggression, violence, theft, and fraud.

Charity is no substitute for justice. If we never challenge a social order that allows some to accumulate wealth--even if they decide to help the less fortunate--while others are short-changed, then even acts of kindness end up supporting unjust arrangements. We must never ignore the injustices that make charity necessary, or the inequalities that make it possible.

There can be no prosperity without law and order.

History will also give occasion to expatiate on the advantage of civil orders and constitutions; how men and their properties are protected by joining in societies and establishing government; their industry encouraged and rewarded, arts invented, and life made more comfortable; the advantages of liberty, mischiefs of licentiousness, benefits arising from good laws and a due execution of justice. Thus may the first principles of sound politics be fixed in the minds of youth.

A society regulated by a public sense of justice is inherently stable.

Law is justice. In this proposition a simple and enduring government can be conceived. And I defy anyone to say how even the thought of revolution, of insurrection, of the slightest uprising could arise against a government whose organized force was confined only to suppressing injustice.

Freedom without security portends chaos, perpetual anxiety and fear.