William Henry Moody Quotes

Law is largely crystallized custom.

The lawyers want to govern us by the common law of England. Trust me for it, common sense is a much safer guide for us.

The common law of England has been laboriously built around a mythical figure—the figure of the reasonable man.

Christianity is part of the Common Law of England.

Constitutions are interpreted differently from statutes.

Great cases like hard cases make bad law.

They had to make their own laws in accordance with the necessities of time, and circumstances, the state of affairs, and the experience of judges.

Stare decisis is the policy of the court to stand by precedent;  the term is but an abbreviation of “stare decisis et non quieta movere”--to stand by and adhere to decisions and not disturb what is settled.

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.

What is today supported by precedents will hereafter become a precedent.

The one great principle of the English law is, to make business for itself. There is no other principle distinctly, certainly, and consistently maintained through all its narrow turnings.

If the prosecution of crime is to be conducted with so little regard for that protection which centuries of English law have given to the individual, we are indeed at the dawn of a new era; and much that we have deemed vital to our liberties, is a delusion.

There is nothing certain in the principles of jurisprudence.

Bad facts make bad law.

The Supreme Court, when it decides a new legal question, does not make illegal what was previously legal; it gives a final authoritative determination of whether an action was legal when it took place.

It is very important to know the law, but it is more important to know the judge

Law is not a science, but is essentially empirical.

Law is the prophecy of what a court will do.

The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.

A good king although he be above the law, will subject and frame his actions thereto, for examples sake to his subjects … [He ended up setting a precedent and duty of the crown that has been even harder for some royal family members to keep up with: the setting of example for the subjects sake. Sovereign acts that had been contrary to law had previously been good of bad for the realm as the case would be, but after James' statement, all were bad as they had set poor example for the common folk who must always obey.

The common law existed while the Anglo-Saxons were yet pagans, at a time when they had never yet heard the name of Christ pronounced or that such a character existed.

When Congress writes a good law, then there are fewer lawsuits trying to interpret it.

All new laws, though penned with the greatest technical skill, and passed on the fullest and most mature deliberation, are considered as more or less obscure and equivocal, until their meaning be liquidated and ascertained by a series of particular discussions and adjudications.

The essential principles of revealed religion are part of the common law.

The study of law is, after all, largely the study of history.