"It is more important that innocence be protected……" — John Adams
"It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, "whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection," and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever."
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John Adams
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128 Quotes by John Adams
John Adams has 128 quotes on this site.
A few more worth reading:
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The right of a nation to kill a tyrant in case of necessity can no more be doubted than to…
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Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any…
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Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot…
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Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.
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I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.
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All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want…
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Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people.
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Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did…
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There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man…
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Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society.
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Let us tenderly and kindly cherish, therefore, the means of knowledge. Let us dare to read, think, speak, and write.
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Because power corrupts, society's demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.
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More All Quotes
This quote is filed under All Quotes,
one of 128,558 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
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Total loyalty is possible only when fidelity is emptied of all concrete content, from which changes of mind might naturally…
— Hannah Arendt
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No cause is left but the most ancient of all, the one, in fact, that from the beginning of our…
— Hannah Arendt
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The ultimate end of human acts is eudaimonia, happiness in the sense of living well, which all men desire; all…
— Hannah Arendt
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The new always happens against the overwhelming odds of statistical laws and their probability, which for all practical, everyday purposes…
— Hannah Arendt
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Where all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of…
— Hannah Arendt
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We have almost succeeded in leveling all human activities to the common denominator of securing the necessities of life and…
— Hannah Arendt
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I keep my friends as misers do their treasure, because, of all the things granted us by wisdom, none is…
— Pietro Aretino
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We must all make peace so that we can all live in peace.
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
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The spirit of Ubuntu, that once led Haiti to emerge as the first independent black nation in 1804, helped Venezuela,…
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
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As we all know, many people remain buried under tons of rubble and debris, waiting to be rescued. When we…
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
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Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life.
— Aristophanes
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A friend to all is a friend to none.
— Aristotle
See all 128,558 All Quotes »