Quotes About Injustice

A government which deliberately enacts injustice, and persists in it, will at length ever become the laughing-stock of the world.

There are thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.

It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even to most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support.

La loi n'a jamais rendu les hommes plus justes d'un iota ; et, à cause du respect qu'ils lui marquent, les êtres bien disposés eux-même deviennent les agents de l'injustice.

If there is any hell more unprincipled than our rulers, and we, the ruled, I feel curious to see it.

The only government that I recognize,—and it matters not how few are at the head of it, or how small its army,—is that power that establishes justice in the land, never that which establishes injustice. What shall we think of a government to which all the truly brave and just men in the land are enemies, standing between it and those whom it oppresses? A government that pretends to be Christian and crucifies a million Christs every day!

It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even the most enormous, wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders.

if injustice, is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine.

If some have the pleasure of riding on a rail, others have the misfortune to be ridden upon.

Under a government which imprisons unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

I was never molested by any person but those who represented the State.

It is there that the fugitive slave, and the Mexican prisoner on parole, and the Indian come to plead the wrongs of his race should find them; on that separate but more free and honorable ground, where the State places those who are not with her, but against her—the only house in a slave State in which a free man can abide with honor.

I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated me as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up. I wondered that it should have concluded at length that this was the best use it could put me to, and had never thought to avail itself of my services in some way.

If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.

Sotto un governo che imprigiona ingiustamente non importa chi, il vero posto dove può vivere un uomo giusto è la prigione.

How does it become a man to behave toward the American government today? I answer that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it. I cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slave's government also.

Não é desejável cultivar o respeito às leis no mesmo nível do respeito aos direitos. (...) A lei nunca fez os homens sequer um pouco mais justos; e o respeito reverente pela lei tem levado até mesmo os bem-intencionados a agir quotidianamente como mensageiros da injustiça.

Tous les hommes reconnaissent le droit à la révolution, c'est-à-dire le droit de refuser fidélité et allégeance au gouvernement et le droit de lui résister quand sa tyrannie ou son incapacité sont notoires et intolérables.

If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood.

A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose. If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood.

One afternoon ... I was seized and put into jail, because ... I did not pay a tax to, or recognize the authority of, the state which buys men, women, and children, like cattle at the door of its senate house. I had gone down to the woods for other purposes. But, wherever a man goes, men will pursue and paw him with their dirty institutions, and, if they can, constrain him to belong to their desperate odd-fellow society.

One afternoon, near the end of the first summer, when I went to the village to get a shoe from the cobbler's, I was seized and put into jail, because, as I have elsewhere related, I did not pay a tax to, or recognize the authority of, the State which buys and sells men, women, and children, like cattle, at the door of its senate-house. I

If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go.

La legge non ha mai reso gli uomini neppure poco più giusti; e anzi, a causa del rispetto della legge, perfino gli onesti sono quotidianamente trasformati in agenti d'ingiustizia.