Quotes About Precedents

What's law? Control? Law filters chaos and what drips through? Serenity? Law—our highest ideal and our basest nature. Don't look too closely at the law. Do, and you'll find the rationalized interpretations, the legal casuistry, the precedents of convenience. You'll find the serenity, which is just another word for death.

Ahh, laws," he said. He crossed to the window, pulled back the draperies as though he could look out. "What's law? Control? Law filters chaos and what drips through? Serenity? Law—our highest ideal and our basest nature. Don't look too closely at the law. Do, and you'll find the rationalized interpretations, the legal casuistry, the precedents of convenience. You'll find the serenity, which is just another word for death.

O que é a lei? Controle? A lei filtra o caos e o que passa por ela? A serenidade? A lei: nosso ideal mais elevado e nossa natureza mais baixa. Não observe a lei muito de perto. Se o fizer, encontrará as interpretações racionalizadas, o casuísmo legal, os precedentes da conveniência. Encontrará a serenidade, que é só mais um sinônimo de morte.

Law—our highest ideal and our basest nature. Don't look too closely at the law. Do, and you'll find the rationalized interpretations, the legal casuistry, the precedents of convenience. You'll find the serenity, which is just another word for death.

That's the problem with precedents. Even the extreme ones tend to get repeated.

I]deas, when implemented, turn into precedents with unpredictable and potentially disturbing consequences.

In other words, ideas, when implemented, turn into precedents with unpredictable and potentially disturbing consequences. As the British historian and politician Lord Acton described the effect that our Revolutionary War had on our French allies, "What the French took from the Americans was their theory of revolution, not their theory of government—their cutting, not their sewing.

I noticed that in advances as well as declines, stock prices were apt to show certain habits, so to speak. There was no end of parallel cases and these made precedents to guide me.

If instead it reacted it meant that precedents had failed me and I was wrong; and the only thing to do when a man is wrong is to be right by ceasing to be wrong.

It is but too common, of late, to condemn the acts of our predecessors and to pronounce them unjust, unwise, or unpatriotic from not adverting to the circumstances under which they acted. Thus, to judge is to do great injustice to the wise and patriotic men who preceded us.

Finally, an orator must have a keen mind capable of remembering a vast array of relevant precedents and examples from history, along with a thorough knowledge of the law and civil statutes.

Reform therefore, without bravery, or scandal of former times and persons; but yet set it down to thyself, as well to create good precedents, as to follow them.

Defining marriage is a power that should be left to the states. Moreover, no state should be forced to recognize a marriage that is not within its own laws, Constitution, and legal precedents.

As a consequence of combining direct and legal action, far-reaching precedents were established, which served, in turn, to extend the areas of desegregation. Why We Can't Wait, 1963

If we can learn anything from the past, it is how few precedents are now relevant in the changed marital landscape in which we operate today.

History never repeats, but there are the obvious precedents that pessimists can reach for: Sarajevo, 1914; the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia, 1938. But equally relevant might be the tragically meaningless guarantees Britain extended to Poland in 1939.

I don't seem to be able to learn from experience or anything useful. History doesn't help me. Precedents don't inform my experience.

Historically courts in this country have been insulated. We do not look beyond our borders for precedents.

If you're strong enough, there are no precedents.

The doctrine of the law then is this: that precedents and rules must be followed, unless flatly absurd or unjust: for though their reason be not obvious at first view, yet we owe such a deference to former times as not to suppose they acted wholly without consideration.

Law is a formless mass of isolated decisions.

But man's capacities have never been measured; nor are we to judge of what he can do by any precedents, so little have been tried.

But man's capacities have never been measured; nor are we to judge of what he can do by any precedents, so little has been tried.

Occasionally we have to interpret an international treaty - one, perhaps, affecting airlines and liability for injury to passengers or damage to goods. Then, of course, we have to look to the precedents of other member nations in resolving issues.