Edward Coke Quotes

Any rule, not existing in the nature of things, or that is not permanent, universal and inflexible in its application, is no law, according to any correct definition of the term law.

The principle of equity first came into evidence in Roman jurisprudence and was derived by analogy from the physical meaning of the word.

I think that it is important for people to understand that whether a good-guy or a bad-guy wins a case is less important than what the law is that the case results in.

Reason is the life of the law; nay, the common law itself is nothing else but reason - the law which is perfection of reason.

It is the merit of the common law that it decides the case first and determines the principles afterward.

Law is largely crystallized custom.

There is not, in the whole compass of human affairs, so noble a spectacle as that which is displayed in the progress of jurisprudence; where we may contemplate the cautious and unwearied exertion of a succession of wise men, through a long course of ages, withdrawing every case, as it arises, from the dangerous power of discretion, and subjecting it to inflexible rules.

It seems to me that stare decisis ought to be applied even to the doctrine of stare decisis, and I confess never to have heard of this new, keep-what-you-want-and-throw-away-the-rest version.

There is nothing certain in the principles of jurisprudence.

Reason is the life of the law; nay, the common law itself is nothing else but reason....

Law is error, you see. It's an attempt to write down a lot of things everyone ought to know anyway.

Our common law is the stock instance of a combination of custom and its successive adaptations.

Let's create a legal system that can work.

I take judge-made law as one of the existing realities of life.

The rules and principles of case law have never been treated as final truths but as working hypotheses, continually retested in those great laboratories of the law, the courts of justice. Every new case is an experiment, and if the accepted rule which seems applicable yields a result which is felt to be unjust, the rule is reconsidered.

All human laws are, properly speaking, only declaratory; they have no power over the substance of original justice.

The Roman Code was merely an enunciation in words of the existing customs of the Roman people.

History or custom or social utility or some compelling sense of justice or sometimes perhaps a semi-intuitive apprehension of the pervading spirit of our law must come to the rescue of the anxious judge and tell him where to go.

It cannot be assumed that equity was following common law whenever they agreed, any more than the converse.

The law, in our case, seems to make the right; and the very reverse ought to be done - the right should make the law.

But I have always said that it's important we must make sure that justice is at all time be maintained.

I tried to decide each case based on the law and the Constitution.

There is no such thing as justice in the abstract; it is merely a compact between men.

It is a maxim among these lawyers, that whatever hath been done before, may legally be done again: and therefore they take special care to record all the decisions formerly made against common justice and the general reason of mankind.

Our lady the Common Law is a very wise old lady though she still has something to learn in telling what she knows.