A Quote by Jeremy Bentham

Lawyers are the only persons in whom ignorance of the law is not punished.

Jeremy Bentham

Quote Topics

Legal Ignorance Ignorance Of The Law Law Lawyers Only Persons Punished Whom

Quote Author

Jeremy Bentham
English - Philosopher
February 15, 1748 - June 6, 1832

If he who breaks the law is not punished, he who obeys it is cheated. This, and this alone, is why lawbreakers ought to be punished: to authenticate as good, and to encourage as useful, law-abiding behavior. The aim of criminal law cannot be correction or deterrence; it can only be the maintenance of the legal order.

Thomas Szasz

But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.

Frederic Bastiat

Congress is, after all, not a body of laymen unfamiliar with the commonplaces of our law. This legislation was the formulation of the two Judiciary Committees, all of whom are lawyers, and the Congress is predominately a lawyers' body.

Felix Frankfurter

The law can be an instrument of equalization only as it takes from some persons and gives to other persons. When the law does this, it is an instrument of plunder.

Frederic Bastiat

Educating Lawyers succeeds admirably in describing the educational programs at virtually every American law school. The call for the integration of the three apprenticeships seems to me exactly what is needed to make legal education more professional, to prepare law students better for the practice of law, and to address societal expectations of lawyers.

Stephen Wizner

The Lawyers' trade is a trade built entirely on words. And so long as the lawyers carefully keep to themselves the key to what those words mean, the only way the average man can find out what is going on is to become a lawyer, or at least to study law, himself. All of which makes it very nice -- and very secure -- for the lawyers.

Fred Rodell

He needs to be punished because the law hasn't punished him. He's never done any hard time.

David Haye

It has something to do with the facts and the law and who the judges are. So I think lawyers sometimes exaggerate their role in winning and losing. Lawyers do have a role, and a major role, but they're not the only players in this game.

Floyd Abrams

The law cannot forgive, for the law has not been wronged, only broken; only persons can be wronged. The law can pardon, but it can only pardon what it has the power to punish.

W. H. Auden

Lawyers are men whom we hire to protect us from lawyers.

Elbert Hubbard

Lawyers have their duties as citizens, but they also have special duties as lawyers. Their obligations go far deeper than earning a living as specialists in corporation or tax law. They have a continuing responsibility to uphold the fundamental principles of justice from which the law cannot depart.

Robert Kennedy

All the judges are lawyers; they interpret and enforce our laws. There is no separation of powers where the lawyers are concerned. There is only a concentration of all government power - in the lawyers.

Fred Rodell

It is the lawyers who run our civilization for us -- our governments, our business, our private lives. Most legislators are lawyers; they make our laws. Most presidents, governors, commissioners, along with their advisers and brain-trusters are lawyers; they administer our laws. All the judges are lawyers; they interpret and enforce our laws. There is no separation of powers where the lawyers are concerned. There is only a concentration of all government power -- in the lawyers.

Fred Rodell

Animists are people who recognize that the world is full of persons, only some of whom are human, and that life is always loved in relationship with others. Animism is lived out in various ways that are all about learning to act respectfully (carefully and constructively) toward and among other persons.

Graham Harvey

In Massachusetts, where properly qualified 'persons' were allowed to practice law, the Supreme Court decided that a woman was not a 'person,' and a special act of the legislature had to be passed before Miss Lelia Robinson could be admitted to the bar. But today women are lawyers.