Jonathan Turley Quotes

Laws are often made to express collective ethical principles, to establish a climate of opinion …

We find the people to be no better than their laws.

Never create by law what can be accomplished by morality.

As long as the law exists, there will be morality.

The law exists to express our values.

The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage.

Morality is the thing upon which your friends smile, and immorality is the thing upon which they frown

So many laws argues so many sins.

Good morals lead to good laws.

I like the English. They have the most rigid code of immorality in the world.

You can't legislate morality.

The law is immoral.

Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government; they are not African or Asian or European: they are good or bad.

Decency is the least of all laws, but yet it is the law which is most strictly observed.

It ain't no sin if you crack a few laws now and then, just so long as you don't break any.

You say: "Here are persons who are lacking in morality or religion," and you turn to the law. But law is force. And need I point out what a violent and futile effort it is to use force in the matters of morality and religion?

The Ten Commandments have served as a symbol of law, not only in the United States, but in other countries of the world. On the frieze of the Supreme Court is Moses holding the tablets of the Ten Commandments written in Hebrew, Now I don’t think that is a state endorsement of Judaism.

Law is largely crystallized custom.

Some things are easier to legalize than to make legitimate.

It's very much simpler to get rid of any written rule you choose than it is an item of customary morality... while laws are preserved on tablets of wood or stone, customary morality is engraved deep in our living souls

Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government.

The law is the public conscience.

The criminal law tries to define moral standards.

Honor to a Spaniard, no matter how dishonest, is as real a thing as water, wine, or olive oil. There is honor among pickpockets and honor among whores. It is simply that the standards differ.

What is morality in any given time or place? It is what the majority then and there happen to like, and immorality is what they dislike.