Skip to content

For good or for ill, [government] teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law.

— Louis Brandeis

Another quote →

More quotes by Louis Brandeis

If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.

If we would guide by the light of reason, we must let our minds be bold.

Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.

Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burnt women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fears.

We must make our choice. We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.

All Louis Brandeis quotes →

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Louis Brandeis (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.