We shall succeed only so far as we continue to undertake “the intolerable labor of thought” — that most distasteful of all our activities.
Learned HandWe lose the forest for the trees, forgetting, even so far as we think at all, that we are trustees for those who come after us, squandering the patrimony which we have received.
Learned HandThere is no surer way to misread any document than to read it literally. As nearly as we can, we must put ourselves in the place of those who uttered the words, and try to divine how they would have dealt with the unforeseen situation; and, although their words are by far the most decisive evidence of what they would have done, they are by no means final.
Learned HandYou cannot raise the standard against oppression, or leap into the breach to relieve injustice, and still keep an open mind to every disconcerting fact, or an open ear to the cold voice of doubt. I am satisfied that a scholar who tries to combine these parts sells his birthright for a mess of pottage; that, when the final count is made, it will be found that the impairment of his powers far outweighs any possible contribution to the causes he has espoused.
Learned HandThe spirit of liberty is the spirit of him who, near two thousand years ago, taught mankind that lesson it has never learned ... .
Learned HandThere is something monstrous in commands couched in invented and unfamiliar language; an alien master is the worst of all. The language of the law must not be foreign to the ears of those who are to obey it.
Learned HandFor, when all is said, as my friend George Rublee likes to put it, the only success is to be a success as a person; and it is still not too late for that.
Learned HandToday in America vast concourses of youth are flocking to our colleges, eager for something, just what they do not know.
Learned HandBipartisan democracy presupposes the individual, whose welfare is identical with that of the community in which he lives, the absence of coherent social classes, a basic uniformity of interest throughout.
Learned HandLife is made up of constant calls to action, and we seldom have time for more than hastily contrived answers.
Learned HandWhen I say that a thing is true, I mean that I cannot help believing it... But...I do not venture to assume that my inabilities in the way of thought are inabilities of the universe. I therefore define truth as the system of my limitations, and leave absolute truth for those who are better equipped.
Learned HandA society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few.
Learned HandThe hand that rules the press, the radio, the screen and the far-spread magazine, rules the country.
Learned HandTyranny is tyranny, no matter what its form; the free man will resist it if his courage serves.
Learned HandAll discussion, all debate, all dissidence tends to question and in consequence, to upset existing convictions; that is precisely its purpose and its justification.
Learned HandLiberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it.
Learned HandI often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon law and upon courts. These are false hopes, believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there it needs no constitution, no law, no courts to save it.
Learned HandThe successful competitor, having been urged to compete, must not be turned upon when he wins.
Learned HandHere I am an old man in a long nightgown making muffled noises at people who may be no worse than I am.
Learned HandThe use of history is to tell us what we are, for at our birth we are nearly empty vessels and we become what our tradition pours into us.
Learned HandOur dangers, as it seems to me, are not from the outrageous but from the conforming; not from those who rarely and under the lurid glare of obloquy upset our moral complaisance, or shock us with unaccustomed conduct, but from those, the mass of us, who take their virtues and their tastes, like their shirts and their furniture, from the limited patterns which the market offers.
Learned HandThe fathers who contrived and passed the Consititution were wise in their generation; as time passes, we come more and more to realize their powers of divination.
Learned Hand"I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that ye may be mistaken." I should like to have that written over the portals of every church, every school, and every courthouse, and, may I say, of every legislative body in the United States. I should like to have every court begin, "I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that we may be mistaken."
Learned HandThe mutual confidence on which all else depends can be maintained only by an open mind and a brave reliance upon free discussion.
Learned HandEvery smallest step of modern industry depends upon a cooperation whose maintenance and regulation is the very stuff of law.
Learned HandWhat seems fair enough against a squalid huckster of bad liquor may take on a different face, if used by a government determined to suppress political opposition under the guise of sedition.
Learned HandThe mid-day sun is too much for most eyes; one is dazzled even with its reflection. Be careful that too broad and high an aim does not paralyze your effort and clog your springs of action.
Learned HandIt is the daily; it is the small; it is the cumulative injuries of little people that we are here to protect....If we are able to keep our democracy, there must be once commandment: THOU SHALT NOT RATION JUSTICE.
Learned HandIt is enough that we set out to mold the motley stuff of life into some form of our own choosing; when we do, the performance is itself the wage.
Learned HandWhat to an outsider will be no more than the vigorous presentation of a conviction, to an employee may be the manifestation of a determination which it is not safe to thwart.
Learned HandYou cannot raise the standard against oppression, or leap into the breach to relieve injustice, and still keep an open mind to every disconcerting fact, or an open ear to the cold voice of doubt.
Learned HandReputation, like a face, is the symbol of its possessor and creator, and another can use it only as a mask.
Learned HandJustice is the tolerable accommodation of the conflicting interests of society, and I don't believe there is any royal road to attain such accommodation concretely.
Learned HandThe public official must pick his way nicely, must learn to placate though not to yield too much, to have the art of honeyed words but not to seem neutral, and above all to keep constantly audible, visible, likable, even kissable.
Learned HandConservative political opinion in America cleaves to the tradition of the judge as passive interpreter, believing that his absolute loyalty to authoritative law is the price of his immunity from political pressure and of the security of his tenure.
Learned HandWe prate of freedom; we are in deadly fear of life, as much of our own American scene betrays.
Learned HandWe recently had a referendum in New York about extending the forest preserve. The city voted for it by a large majority; yet as I walk the streets I do not see afforestation written with conviction on the harried faces of my fellow citizens.
Learned HandThe profession of the law of which he [a judge] is a part is charged with the articulation and final incidence of the successive efforts towards justice; it must feel the circulation of the communal blood or it will wither and drop off, a useless member.
Learned HandIf a community decides that some conduct is prejudicial to itself, and so decides by numbers sufficient to impose its will upon dissenters, I know of no principle which can stay its hand.
Learned Hand