List of Benjamin Cardozo Quotes

The Prophet And The Martyr Do Not See The Hooting Throng. Their Eyes Are Fixed On The Eternities.

Opinion Has A Significance Proportioned To The Sources That Sustain It.

The Constant Assumption Runs Throughout The Law That The Natural And Spontaneous Evolutions Of Habit Fix The Limits Of Right And Wrong.

The Validity Of A Tax Depends Upon Its Nature, And Not Upon Its Name.

The Difference Is No Less Real Because It Is Of Degree.

History Or Custom Or Social Utility Or Some Compelling Sense Of Justice Or Sometimes Perhaps A Semi-intuitive Apprehension Of The Pervading Spirit Of Our Law Must Come To The Rescue Of The Anxious Judge And Tell Him Where To Go.

Danger Invites Rescue. ... The Wrongdoer May Not Have Foreseen The Coming Of A Deliverer. He Is Accountable As If He Had.

I Take Judge-made Law As One Of The Existing Realities Of Life.

With Traps And Obstacles And Hazards Confronting Us On Every Hand, Only Blindness Or Indifference Will Fail To Turn In All Humility, For Guidance Or For Warning, To The Study Of Examples.

In Our Worship Of Certainty We Must Distinguish Between The Sound Certainty And The Sham, Between What Is Gold And What Is Tinsel; And Then, When Certainty Is Attained, We Must Remember That It Is Not The Only Good; That We Can Buy It At Too High A Price; That There Is Danger In Perpetual Quiescence As Well As In Perpetual Motion; And That A Compromise Must Be Found In A Principle Of Growth.

Due Process Is A Growth Too Sturdy To Succumb To The Infection Of The Least Ingredient Of Error.

Code Is Followed By Commentary, And Commentary By Revision, And Thus The Task Is Never Done.