Floyd Abrams Quotes

I strongly support not just citizenship classes but also teaching children how the law works and the many ways it affects their lives.

I'm trying to demystify the whole process. Make it simple, make it palatable. I want people to have respect for the law, and I want to educate people on the basics of the law.

Every man should know something of law; if he knows enough to keep out of it, he is a pretty good lawyer.

That's an interesting question. I would say that in general Americans know very little about the law. It's one of those things that most of us take for granted.

You can't learn everything you need to know legally.

Why I find Louis Brandeis so exciting and inspiring because he's teaching us - good legal writing is not a matter of taste, it's a matter of connection with fellow citizens and of democratic education.

Laws teach us to know when we commit injury and when we suffer it.

Today, public understanding of our past and our system of government is pitifully low.

Law without education is a dead letter. With education the needed law follows without effort and, of course, with power to execute itself; indeed, it seems to execute itself.

I think the law should be comprehensible not only to those who work with it but also to those who are governed by it.

Woman should hasten to repair her ignorance of the country’s laws and needs, by a thorough knowledge and acquaintance of those which govern her and affect humanity.

A competent knowledge of the laws of that society in which we live, is the proper accomplishment of every gentleman and scholar

By God, we’ve got to get rid of the lawyers.

As a child, I wanted to be a lawyer because I thought lawyers and the law were wonderful. But they are more wonderful, I think, than I had thought.

There is no jewel in the world comparable to learning; no learning so excellent both for Prince and subject, as knowledge of laws; and no knowledge of any laws so necessary for all estates and for all causes, concerning goods, lands or life, as the common laws of England.

All democracies demand common public education because nothing makes people so much alike as the same education.

The way you get democracy to function is by informing the public.

No system of criminal justice can, or should, survive if it comes to depend for its continued effectiveness on the citizens' abdication through unawareness of their constitutional rights. No system worth preserving should have to fear that if an accused is permitted to consult with a lawyer, he will become aware of, and exercise, these rights.

I want people to vote, I want them to pay attention. I want them to get up and go and vote and care about this country, inform themselves about the issues and I also want them to not vote for somebody just based on gender or race, based on qualification.

I think that's easier to read. Pardon me. Less difficult to read.

Every man must be taken to be cognizant of the law, otherwise there is no saying to what extent the excuse of ignorance may not be Law carried. It would be urged in almost every case.

The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even the intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes no skill in the science of law.

There needs to be clearer communication for the public avout how valuable it [animal testing] is

The Romans had been able to post their laws on boards in public places, confidant that enough literate people existed to read them; far into the Middle Ages, even kings remained illiterate.

Dear Sir: Yours of the 24th. asking 'the best mode of obtaining a thorough knowledge of the law' is received. The mode is very simple, though laborious, and tedious. It is only to get the books, and read, and study them carefully. Begin with Blackstone's Commentaries, and after reading it carefully through, say twice, take up Chitty's Pleading, Greenleaf's Evidence, & Story's Equity &c. in succession. Work, work, work, is the main thing.