Just Action Quotes

Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as is cooperation with good.

We become just by performing just action, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave action.

He who pays no attention to what his neighbor does, says or thinks, preferring to concentrate on making his own actions appropriate and justifiable, better uses his time.

Reflection is only a partial understanding of truth if it does not translate itself in practice into commitments to the common good and justice. Truth is not mere abstraction but something to be done and is only apprehended when this is realized.

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.

It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do; but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do.

Retire into thyself. The rational principle which rules has this nature, that it is content with itself when it does what is just, and so secures tranquility.

We have done the right thing and history will be the test of that.

My purpose is to be, in my action, just and constitutional; and yet practical, in performing the important duty, with which I am charged, of maintaining the unity, and the free principles of our common country.

It is just a matter of simple justice…. It was the right thing to do.

Yes, America must do the right thing, but to provide moral leadership, America must do it in the right way, too.

A man should always have these two rules in readiness. First, to do only what the reason of your ruling and legislating faculties suggest for the service of man. Second, to change your opinion whenever anyone at hand sets you right and unsettles you in an opinion, but this change of opinion should come only because you are persuaded that something is just or to the public advantage, not because it appears pleasant or increases your reputation.