Stephen Breyer Quotes

32 quotes in 361 categories

• But once the person is selected, at that point that person is independent.
• We are selected, but I grew up in California and in San Francisco and there was a system of electing judges.
• I mean, there are lots of people who get married who can't have children. To take a state that does allow adoption and say-there, what…
• There are loads of countries that have nice written constitutions like ours. But there aren't loads of countries where they're followed.
• Every citizen has to figure out what kind of government he or she wants.
• And the problem is once you get into this campaign business and begin to have a lot of money, then the person on the bench…
• Independence doesn't mean you decide the way you want.
• Independence means you decide according to the law and the facts.
• Nobody wants a judge to be subject to the political whim of the moment.
• Judges are appointed often through the political process
• We can speak about the institution, but ultimately the bar is the group that both is in touch with the public on the one hand…
• You can have many different selection systems, but the bottom line has to be a system that, once the judge takes office that judge will…
• You will read in the newspaper more often about federal courts, but the law that affects people, the trials that affect human beings are by…
• People have to be educated and they have to stick to it. If people lose that respect, an awful lot is lost
• It's important to every American that the law protect his or her basic liberty
• It doesn't help to fight crime to put people in prison who are innocent.
• This understanding, underlying constitutional interpretation since the New Deal, reflects the Constitution's demands for structural flexibility sufficient to adapt substantive laws and institutions to rapidly…
• The advantages? Exercise, no parking problems, gas prices, it's fun. An automobile is expensive. You have to find a place to park and it's not…
• To threaten the institution is to threaten fair administration of justice and protection of liberty.
• And in that confirmation process, I sat for 17 hours in front of a senate judiciary committee.

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