Learned Hand Quotes

True freedom requires the rule of law and justice, and a judicial system in which the rights of some are not secured by the denial of rights to others.

Here everyone is his own master. Civil liberty places all inhabitants on an equal footing. The humble cannot be oppressed by the mighty, nor the poor by the rich.

Free governments are the only way to insure that the strong are just and the weak are valued.

In a really equal democracy, every or any section would be represented, not disproportionately, but proportionately. ... Unless they are, there is not equal government, but a government of inequality and privilege: one part of the people rule over the rest: there is a part whose fair and equal share of influence in the representation is withheld from them, contrary to all just government, but, above all, contrary to the principle of democracy, which professes equality as its very root and foundation.

Democracy is not meant to be efficient, it is meant to be fair.

We will not know our own injustice if we cannot imagine justice. We will not be free if we do not imagine freedom. We cannot demand that anyone try to attain justice and freedom who has not had a chance to imagine them as attainable.

Had courage, wisdom, and reason always prevailed in people, there would not have been oppressions and oppressors.

If I had to choose between baseball’s Hall of Fame and first class citizenship for all of my people. I would say first-class citizenship.

Happy, thrice happy shall they be pronounced hereafter, who have contributed any thing, who have performed the meanest office in erecting this stupendous fabrick of Freedom and Empire on the broad basis of Independency; who have assisted in protecting the rights of humane nature and establishing an Asylum for the poor and oppressed of all nations and religions.

Free people can treat each other justly, but they can't make life fair. To get rid of the unfairness among individuals, you have to exercise power over them. The more fairness you want, the more power you need. Thus, all dreams of fairness become dreams of tyranny in the end.

The fundamental purpose of Marxism is the total control of a population under the belief that individualism and free markets lead to great disparities and inequalities and injustices and unfairness. Now, this is the outward appeal. Marxism is evil, and Marx knew it, but the appeal that seduces people is its justice and equality and fairness. What they don't tell you is the equality is spread equally to the point everybody's miserably equal and miserably the same.

If the Constitution can be used against one, it can be used against all.

I insist that people - wherever they live - have their rights and they must be able to fight for them.

We can't make America great again without love, without hope, without justice, without peace and without an acknowledgement that the fear that was stoked not only by President-Elect Trump's campaign, but also a lot of fear was stoked by Democrats as well, but there are people who are really fearful.

Hatred of injustice is not the same thing as a love for everyday people.

To make one people better than the other would be ungodly in the first place.

Equality is the heart and essence of democracy, freedom, and justice, equality of opportunity in industry, in labor unions, schools and colleges, government, politics, and before the law. There must be no dual standards of justice, no dual rights, privileges, duties, or responsibilities of citizenship. No dual forms of freedom.

We have to take care of people on all sides. We need justice.

Justice is the right of the weakest.

It is not possible to be in favor of justice for some people and not be in favor of justice for all people.

Everyone's gotta have a voice, to be able to speak out. Left supresses right, right supresses left, and what's left and what's right? You know? It's America. You gotta be able to speak out. That's why people came here from all over the world: to have a fair shake. Not more than somebody else - the same.

I always felt from the beginning that you had to defend people you disliked and feared as well as those you admired.

When there is oppression, the only self-respecting thing is to rise and say this shall cease today, because my right is justice. If you are stronger, you have to help the weaker boy or girl both in play and in the work.

I think the detective story is by far the best upholder of the democratic doctrine in literature. I mean, there couldn't have been detective stories until there were democracies, because the very foundation of the detective story is the thesis that if you're guilty you'll get it in the neck and if you're innocent you can't possibly be harmed. No matter who you are.

God doesn't want his people to go second-class.