Abraham Lincoln Law Quotations

The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.

Law is nothing else but the best reason of wise men applied for ages to the transactions and business of mankind.

If you wish to be a lawyer, attach no consequence to the place you are in, or the person you are with; but get books, sit down anywhere, and go to reading for yourself. That will make a lawyer of you quicker than any other way.

In law it is good policy to never plead what you need not, lest you oblige yourself to prove what you can not.

When I so pressingly urge a strict observance of all the laws, let me not be understood as saying there are no bad laws, nor that grievances may not arise, for the redress of which, no legal provisions have been made. I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say, that, although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still while they continue in force, for the sake of example, they should be religiously observed.

It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination.

Legislation and adjudication must follow, and conform to, the progress of society.

Slavery is wrong. If Slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and Constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away.

I hold, that in contemplation of universal law, and of the Constitution, the Union of these States is perpetual.

I therefore consider that in view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union is unbroken; and to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States.

But the proclamation, as law, either is valid, or is not valid. If it is not valid, it needs no retraction. If it is valid, it can not be retracted, any more than the dead can be brought to life.

Let me not be understood as saying that there are no bad laws, nor that grievances may not arise for the redress of which no legal provisions have been made. I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say that although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still, while they continue in force, for the sake of example they should be religiously observed.

I dared not trust the case on the presumption that the court knows everything. In fact, I argued it on the presumption that the court didn't know anything.

Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others.

No organic law can ever be framed with a provision specifically applicable to every question which may occur in practical administration. .. No foresight can anticipate nor any document of reasonable length contain express provisions for all possible questions.

I take it that it is best for all to leave each man free to acquire property as fast as he can. Some will get wealthy. I dont believe in a law to prevent a man from getting rich; it would do more harm than good.

Let no young man choosing the law for a calling for a moment yield to the popular belief -- resolve to be honest at all events; and if in your own judgment you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer.

A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations...is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects it does of necessity fly to anarchy or to despotism.

Laws change; people die; the land remains.

The negative principle that no law is free law, is not much known except among lawyers.

Let reverence for the laws . . . become the political religion of the nation.

It is the quality of revolutions not to go by old lines or old laws; but to break up both, and make new ones.

A nation may be said to consist of its territory, its people, and its laws. The territory is the only part which is of certain durability.

When I have a particular case in hand, I have that motive and feel an interest in the case, feel an interest in ferreting out the questions to the bottom, love to dig up the question by the roots and hold it up and dry it before the fires of the mind.

Again, a law may be both constitutional and expedient, and yet may be administered in an unjust and unfair way.

I understand that it is a maxim of law, that a poor plea may be a good plea to a bad declaration.

Extemporaneous speaking should be practised [sic] and cultivated. It is the lawyer's avenue to the public. However able and faithful he may be in other respects, people are slow to bring him business if he cannot make a speech. And yet there is not a more fatal error to young lawyers than relying too much on speech-making. If any one, upon his rare powers of speaking, shall claim an exemption from the drudgery of the law, his case is a failure in advance.

How many times have I laughed at you telling me plainly that I was too lazy to be anything but a lawyer.

Prohibition will work great injury to the cause of temperance. It is a species of intemperance within itself, for it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes. A Prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.

In law it is good policy never to plead what you need not, lest you oblige yourself to prove what you cannot

No law is stronger than is the public sentiment where it is to be enforced.