Law Complexity Quotes

James Madison foresaw our current condition, in which laws are “so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood,” and “undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is today, can guess what it will be tomorrow.” Hence, Madison’s paradox: The multiplication of laws undermines the rule of law. “Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?”

[Describing lawyers:] ... men who get their living intirely from the quarrils, follys, disputes and distresses of the Many, and the intricacy of our Laws.

Like other high subjects, the Law gives no ground to common sense.

The glorious uncertainty of the law was a thing well known and complained of, by all ignorant people, but all learned gentleman considered it as its greatest excellency.

All lawyers are going to have to - if we really want to attain civil justice - address the issue of how complicated we have made the laws: what we have done to ensnarl the American people in bureaucratic rules and regulations that make access to services or compliance with the law sometimes difficult, if not impossible.

Copyright law is too confusing.

The United States has so many laws, into the millions, that experts have lost track of just how many laws we have.

Lawyers are shy of meddling with the Law on their own account: knowing it to be an edged tool of uncertain application, very expensive in the working, and rather remarkable for its properties of close shaving than for its always shaving the right person.

There are no good laws except simple laws.

If the laws could speak for themselves, they would complain of the lawyers.

It would be gross understatement to say that the Telecommunications Act of 1996 is not a model of clarity. It is in many important respects a model of ambiguity or indeed even self-contradiction.