Bryan Stevenson Quotes

I have no feelings for the criminal. All my feelings lie with the victim.

Justice is possible without equality, I believe, because of compassion and understanding. If I have compassion, then if I have more than you, which is unequal, I will still do the just thing by you.

I have a secret passion for mercy. . . but justice is what keeps happening to people.

I believe that inside many Americans lies certain uneasiness about capital punishment.

Mercy more becomes a magistrate than the vindictive wrath which men call justice.

Don't let us rejoice in punishment, even when the hand of God alone inflicts it. The best of us are but poor wretches, just saved from shipwreck. Can we feel anything but awe and pity when we see a fellow-passenger swallowed by the waves?

Believe the best about people. Pray for their short comings. You are not the standard. We all need grace.

Believe me, the gods spare the afflicted, and do not always oppress those who are unfortunate.

If your are ever called upon to chasten a person, never chasten beyond the balm you have within you to bind up.

There is a difference between grace and mercy. Mercy is the decision of God not to punish us. But grace is the decision of God to save and bless us.

Pity would be no more, If we did not make somebody poor. Mercy no more could be, If all were happy as we.

Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy.

Grace is when you should be totally punished but are blessed for no reason.

I'm sentimental about Jesus on the cross. Jesus was a Jew, and also I believe he was a catalyst, and I think he offended people because his message was to love your neighbour as yourself; in other words, no one is better than somebody else. He embraced all people, whether it was a beggar on the street or a prostitute, and he admonished a group of Jews who were not observing the precepts of the Torah. So he rattled a lot of people's cages.

Since the late 1970's, the main focus of prisons has been punishment, not rehabilitation. It's hard to believe, but you would be hard-pressed to find a meaningful violence-prevention class in a federal or state penitentiary. And 'we the people' are footing the bill to keep these folks imprisoned. It costs on average $46,000 a year to keep an adult incarcerated in California and about the same for New York State.

The wise man will not pardon any crime that ought to be punished, but he will accomplish, in a nobler way, all that is sought in pardoning. He will spare some and watch over some, because of their youth, and others on account of their ignorance. His clemency will not fall short of justice, but will fulfill it perfectly.

There are some duties we owe even to those who have wronged us. There is, after all, a limit to retribution and punishment.

We can't say that we believe in each other's fundamental humanity, and then turn a blind eye to the reality of each other's existence, and the truth of each others' hearts. We must be allies and we must be allies in this business, because to be represented is to be humanized, and as long as anyone anywhere is being made to feel less human, our very definition of humanity is at stake, and we are all vulnerable.

If compassion and mercy are not compatible with politics then something is the matter with politics.

there's no justice, there's only love.

To pardon the oppressor is to deal harshly with the oppressed.

I believe that those who promote discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or any other grounds are gravely mistaken about the values that make our nation strong. I will continue to move my administration in the direction of compassion, acceptance, and understanding.

I truly believe slavery is why, as a by-product, we still have a disproportionate amount of black men incarcerated in the USA. It is an extension of that legacy, and that's not going to start to diminish until black people have a new sense of themselves that isn't tied to slavery and feeling inferior. I think the church can be instrumental in that, in terms of repentance, reconciliation and just being more embracing of each other - not just on Sunday, but in life generally.

Forgiveness, that noblest of all self-denial, is a virtue which he alone who can practise in himself can willingly believe in another.

Anyone who tries to improve the lives of animals invariably comes in for criticism from those who believe such efforts are misplaced in a world of suffering humanity.