Judicial Wisdom Quotes

When Justice White retired, he gave me the chance to work for Justice Kennedy, as well. Justice Kennedy was incredibly welcoming and gracious, and like Justice White, he taught me so much. I am forever grateful. And if you've ever met Judge David Sentelle, you'll know just how lucky I was to land a clerkship with him right out of school.

Great judges are also great teachers.

I have been a judge for 15 years and I've made up my own mind during all that time.

Oh, wise young judge.

The wise man will not pardon any crime that ought to be punished, but he will accomplish, in a nobler way, all that is sought in pardoning. He will spare some and watch over some, because of their youth, and others on account of their ignorance. His clemency will not fall short of justice, but will fulfill it perfectly.

I am deeply impressed with the gravity and wisdom with which most federal judges approach the responsibility of sentencing. It is a difficult, soul-searching task at best.

Good judges develop certain habits of mind. One of those habits of mind is the habit of delaying reaching conclusions until everything has been considered.

A wise judge may let mercy temper justice but may not let mercy undo it.

A wise judge, by the craft of the law, was never seduced from its purpose.

The good judge is not he who does hair-splitting justice to every allegation, but who, aiming at substantial justice, rules something intelligible of the guidance of suitors.

The law doth never enforce a man to doe a vaine thing.

Nothing in my early childhood suggested to anyone - except maybe my father - that one day I would be standing here and be known simply as Judge Judy.

No matter how badly senators want to know things, judicial nominees are limited in what they may discuss. That limitation is real, and it comes from the very nature of what judges do.

The indispensible judicial requisite is intellectual humility.

I do think there is a value in the services of judges for long periods of time.

Justice is not to be taken by storm. She is to be wooed by slow advances. Substitute statute for decision, and you shift the center of authority, but add no quota of inspired wisdom.

I think people are great in many different ways. So, I think some justices are great because they have extraordinary wisdom, they have an understanding of how to apply the law in their times in a way that's completely consistent with the text of the law and the purposes of the law, and in a way that's completely right for the times in which they live in.

He that has more Knowledge than Judgment, is made for another Man's use more than his own.

What becomes decisive to a Justice's functioning on the Court in the large area within which his individuality moves is his general attitude toward law, the habits of the mind that he has formed or is capable of unforming, his capacity for detachment, his temperament or training for putting his passion behind his judgment instead of in front of it. The attitudes and qualities which I am groping to characterize are ingredients of what compendiously might be called dominating humility.

A good Judge conceives quickly, judges slowly.

Four things belong to a judge: to hear courteously, to answer wisely, to consider soberly, and to decide impartially.

There is no happiness, there is no liberty, there is no enjoyment of life, unless a man can say, when he rises in the morning, I shall be subject to the decision of no unwise judge today.

I think Judge Learned Hand was a cultured, intelligent man.