Legal Decisions Quotes

Most decisions involving the way that Americans live their lives are not made in the courts.

For almost twenty years, abortion policy in America has been controlled by the courts.

The Supreme Court does not get very reckless very often.

The Supreme Court is very capable of acting quickly when it needs to.

The court of last resort is no longer the Supreme Court. It's 'Nightline.'

The common law is not a brooding omnipresence in the sky, but the articulate voice of some sovereign or quasi sovereign that can be identified; although some decisions with which I have disagreed seem to me to have forgotten the fact.

Sometimes Supreme Court justices surprise you with their decisions - you think they're going to vote one way, but they vote a different way, and I keep an open mind about that. But I think a moral compass is really important for a Supreme Court justice, as it is for any political appointee.

In a recent decision of the Supreme Court, not made, however, by the full court, and concurred in by only four justices, it was held that the seller of a patented mimeograph could bind the purchaser to use only his ink in the machine, though the ink was not patented.

The idea that the brain is not fully formed until you are almost 30 years old has already been introduced, and the Supreme Court already has based two rulings on it.

You can't have one, two, three more picks on the Supreme Court go against our Second Amendment rights.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor serves as a model Supreme Court justice, widely recognized as a jurist with practical values, a sense of the consequences of the legal decisions being made by the Supreme Court.

Most of us see Justice O'Connor as something of an icon, although we do not agree with all of her decisions.

In an era when too many Americans are losing their jobs or working for less, trying to make ends meet, in close cases Judge [Samuel] Alito has ruled the vast majority of the time against the claims of the individual citizens. He has acted instead in favor of government, large corporations and other powerful interests.

If you're going to be a good and faithful judge, you have to resign yourself to the fact that you're not always going to like the conclusions you reach. If you like them all the time, you're probably doing something wrong.

Circumstances alter cases.

I'd worked in the state senate in college and seen how important legal decisions were. And at the last minute, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison said, 'Why don't you come do an internship?' That turned into almost 15 years in the government, in the White House, and at the State Department.

In my work a good library is essential. It enables me to learn the background and previous discussions of the various issues I am called upon to decide. It provides the stability and continuity for the rule of law.

Unlike tennis matches, Supreme Court decisions are tiebreaker-free, meaning the lower-court ruling stands without any high-court guidance.

As I have said repeatedly, if confirmed to the court, I would be part of a team of nine, committed to deciding cases according to the constitution and laws of the United States. I would always strive to be a team player.

Judges in our systems decide on concrete facts and not abstract issues.

My job is to write opinions. I decide cases and write opinions. It is not to respond to idiocy and critics who make statements that are unfounded. That doesn't mean that people shouldn't have constructive criticisms, but it should be constructive.

I believe there's tremendous value in having a Supreme Court with a diverse set of experiences - especially when we're dealing with issues that range from our intimate relationships to how we finance campaigns.

And we made decisions on each of those matters which were ultimately upheld by the courts.

The public must be assured that prosecutorial decisions are made on legal and not political grounds.

All decisions in the criminal justice system must be determined by the physical and scientific evidence, and the credible testimony corroborated by that evidence, not in response to public outcry.