Irving Kaufman famous quotes

The trial lawyer does what Socrates was executed for: making the worse argument appear the stronger.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Stronger #Doe #Trials

Courtrooms contain every symbol of authority that a set designer could imagine. Everyone stands up when you come in. You wear a costume identifying you as, if not quite divine, someone special.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Special #Costumes #Imagine

The Supreme Court's only armor is the cloak of public trust; its sole ammunition, the collective hopes of our society.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Trust #Our Society #Armor

The judicial system is the most expensive machine ever invented for finding out what happened and what to do about it.
-- Irving Kaufman

#History #Machines #Judicial System

To the extent that the judicial profession becomes the daily routine of deciding cases on the most secure precedents and the narrowest grounds available, the judicial mind atrophies and its perspective shrinks.
-- Irving Kaufman

#History #Perspective #Mind

The judge is forced for the most part to reach his audience through the medium of the press whose reporting of judicial decisions is all too often inaccurate and superficial.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Stars #Judging #Decision

No other profession is subject to the public contempt and derision that sometimes befalls lawyers. the bitter fruit of public incomprehension of the law itself and its dynamics.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Law #Dynamics #Fruit

What most impresses us about great jurists is not their tenacious grasps of fine points, honed almost to invisibility; it is the moment when we are suddently aware of the sweep and direction of the law, and its place in the lives of men.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Men #Law #History

Simply according artistic works the same protection as nonartistic works may not be sufficient to protect creativity. After all, the very essence of artistic expression is invention and artists necessarily draw on their own experience. But if the rules of liability are unclear, artists will not be able to know how much disguise is sufficient to protect their claims from the claims of those who may see themselves in the portrayals.
-- Irving Kaufman

#Responsibility #Creativity #Artist

Miserliness is the one vice that grows stronger with increasing years. It yields its sordid pleasures to the end.

Historically, China is not a nation of sportsmen. We traditionally put more emphasis on being close to nature than pushing endlessly to excel. A philosophy that values tranquil contemplation of the landscape cannot easily be adapted to the Olympic slogan of 'higher, stronger, faster.'

Let's stop somebody from doing something! Everybody does too much.

The American people have no control over what the military does. We have no say in American foreign policy.

If I had not felt certain that every additional trial was ordered by infinite love and mercy, I could not have survived my accumulated suffering.

A trial cannot be conducted by announcing the general culpability of a civilization. Only the actual deeds which, at least, stank in the nostrils of the entire world were brought to judgment.

It is an immense loss to have all robust and sustaining expletives refined away from one! At. moments of trial refinement is a feeble reed to lean upon.

Your mother all but accused me of something that is, among my kind, the highest crime a man can commit. There is no trial, only punishment, because it is considered better to let an innocent man die than let a guilty one live." (Page 79.)

In every relationship, sooner or later, there is a court scene. Accusations, counter-accusations, a trial, a verdict.

A fair trial would have been no trial at all.