Judge Learned Hand Quotes

A collection of quotes by Judge Learned Hand.

Learned Hand (1872-1961) was an influential American jurist. Born on January 27, 1872, in Albany, New York, Hand grew up in a prominent family and possessed a keen intellect from an early age. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1896 and began practicing law in New York City.

Hand established himself as a successful lawyer and became noted for his insightful and eloquent arguments. In 1909, President William Howard Taft appointed him as a federal judge for the Southern District of New York. Hand served in this position for over fifty years, becoming one of the most distinguished judges in American legal history.

As a judge, Hand was known for his principled and intellectual approach to the law. He authored numerous influential opinions, particularly in the area of corporate law, antitrust law, and constitutional law. Hand focused on striking a balance between promoting individual liberties and maintaining social order, which earned him respect for his fair and thoughtful reasoning.

Although Hand was never appointed to the United States Supreme Court, many considered him a strong candidate. Nevertheless, his opinions and writings greatly influenced the development of American jurisprudence. Hand's contributions to legal philosophy and his commitment to civil liberties left a lasting legacy that continues to shape the American legal system. Judge Learned Hand passed away on August 18, 1961, but his intellectual influence endures to this day.

I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upo

I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.

Judge Learned Hand

Society

Anyone may so arrange his affairs so that his taxes shall be

Anyone may so arrange his affairs so that his taxes shall be as low as possible. He is not bound to choose that pattern which best pays the treasury. There is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes.

Judge Learned Hand

Taxation

When I hear so much impatient and irritable complaint, so mu

When I hear so much impatient and irritable complaint, so much readiness to replace what we have by guardians for us all, those supermen, evoked somewhere from the clouds, whom none have seen and none are ready to name, I lapse into a dream... I see children playing on the grass, ...they are restive and quarrelsome; they cannot agree to any common plan; their play annoys them; it goes poorly. And one says, let us make Jack the master; Jack knows all about it; Jack will tell us what each is to do and we shall all agree. But Jack is like all the rest; Helen is discontented with her part and Henry with his, and soon they fall again into their old state. No, the children must learn to play by themselves; there is no Jack the master. And in the end slowly and with infinite disappointment they do learn a little; they learn to forbear, to reckon with anther, accept a little where they wanted much, to live and let live, to yield when they must yield; perhaps, we may hope, not to take all they can. But the condition is that they shall be willing at least to listen to one another, to get the habit of pooling their wishes. Somehow or other they must do this, if the play is to go on; maybe it will not, but there is no Jack, in or out of the box, who can come to straighten the game.

Judge Learned Hand

Play/games

Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies th

Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias; the spirit of liberty remembers that not even a sparrow falls to earth unheeded; the spirit of liberty is the spirit of Him who, near two thousand years ago, taught mankind that lesson it has never learned, but has never quite forgotten; that there may be a kingdom where the least shall be heard and considered side by side with the greatest.

Judge Learned Hand


It is enough that we set out to mold the motley stuff of lif

It is enough that we set out to mold the motley stuff of life into some form of our own choosing; when we do, the performance is itself the wage.

Judge Learned Hand

Choice

Our dangers, as it seems to me, are not from the outrageous

Our dangers, as it seems to me, are not from the outrageous but from the conforming; not from those who rarely and under the lurid glare of obloquy upset our moral complaisance, or shock us with unaccustomed conduct, but from those, the mass of us, who take their virtues and their tastes, like their shirts and their furniture, from the limited patterns which the market offers.

Judge Learned Hand


You cannot raise the standard against oppression, or leap in

You cannot raise the standard against oppression, or leap into the breach to relieve injustice, and still keep an open mind to every disconcerting fact, or an open ear to the cold voice of doubt.

Judge Learned Hand

Oppression

We accept the verdict of the past until the need for change

We accept the verdict of the past until the need for change cries out loudly enough to force upon us a choice between the comforts of further inertia and the irksomeness of action.

Judge Learned Hand

Action(s)