End Justifies the Means Quotes

Anything can become excusable when seen from the standpoint of the result

Politics can be relatively fair in the breathing spaces of history; at its critical turning points there is no other rule possible than the old one, that the end justifies the means.

It’s less important to have unanimity than it is making the right decisions and doing the right thing, even though at the outset it might be loathsome.

When things need shaking up, there usually isn’t a nice way of doing it. A good result might be worth a hurtful word.

Assuming you get useful information from torture, then why not always use torture? Why stop at the bomb that’s already been planted and people who know where the explosives are? Why not people who are building the explosives, or people who are donating money, or transferring the funds for the explosives? Why stop at the victim himself? Why not torture the victims’ families, their relatives, their neighbors? If the end justifies the means, then where would you draw the line?

To declare that in the administration of criminal law the end justifies the means -- to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure conviction of a private criminal -- would bring terrible retribution.

People who lie, particularly those who lie really big, can't do it effectively unless they feel that there's a righteous power behind what they're doing. You're entitled to lie because the end justifies the means.

To say that corrupt means corrupt the ends is to believe in the immaculate conception of ends and principles.

As the means, so the end.

The modern man thinks that everything ought to be done for the sake of something else, and never for its own sake.

If the end is right, it justifies the beans!

The press will commonly reflect (or even try to create) the view that the end justifies the means. Those of us dedicated to the law must stand before these gales.

The Holy Scriptures say that jihad will continue till the Day of Judgment. This means that the mujahideen will not revert to ordinary life. You cannot simply abandon jihad. Once you get training to wage jihad, and you wage jihad, you only change locations, but you have to continue the struggle…. The end justifies the means. When you start jihad, it starts dominating you, because it gives you power over the rest of the world. All other things become subordinated to jihad. Even the concept of Islam boils down to jihad for the mujahideen. All other Islamic concepts - even when they are important - they become subordinated to jihad. Jihad becomes the ultimate end even for the Islamic belief system. These mujahideen ignore many, many important Islamic concepts

I totally reject and have rejected throughout my entire career the proposition that the end justifies the means or that a judge should decide cases based on a desire to reach a certain outcome.