Louis D. Brandeis quotes

Louis D. Brandeis, a prominent American jurist and influential Zionist, played a crucial role in shaping the legal landscape of the United States. Born in 1856, Brandeis attended Harvard Law School and later established a reputation for his progressive ideology and innovative legal strategies. As a Supreme Court Justice from 1916 to 1939, his opinions championed individual rights, government transparency, and social justice. Moreover, Brandeis fervently supported the Zionist movement, advocating for the establishment of a Jewish homeland. His legal expertise and moral compass left an indelible mark on American jurisprudence. Discover more about Louis D. Brandeis and his impactful contributions to American law and society at our website.

There must be opportunities for judgment to mature. When, therefore, you increase your business to a very great extent, and the multitude of problems increase with its growth, you will find, in the first place, that the man at the head has a diminishing knowledge of the facts and, in the second place, a diminishing opportunity of exercising a careful judgment upon them.

- Louis D. Brandeis

There are many men now living who were in the habit of using the age-old expression: 'It is as impossible as flying.' The discoveries in physical science, the triumphs in invention, attest the value of the process of trial and error. In large measure, these advances have been due to experimentation.

- Louis D. Brandeis

The so-called control of life insurance companies by policy-holders through mutualization is a farce and its only result is to keep in office a self-constituted, self-perpetuating management.

- Louis D. Brandeis

The most important political office is that of private citizen.

- Louis D. Brandeis

The general rule of law is, that the noblest of human productions – knowledge, truths ascertained, conceptions, and ideas – become, after voluntary communication to others, free as the air to common use.

- Louis D. Brandeis

The bow must be strung and unstrung. There must be time also for the unconscious thinking which comes to the busy man in his play.

- Louis D. Brandeis

That which is man-made can be unmade.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Strong, responsible unions are essential to industrial fair play. Without them the labor bargain is wholly one-sided. The parties to the labor contract must be nearly equal in strength if justice is to be worked out, and this means that the workers must be organized and that their organizations must be recognized by employers as a condition precedent to industrial peace.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Real success in business is to be found in achievements comparable rather with those of the artist or the scientist, of the inventor or statesman. And the joys sought in the profession of business must be like their joys and not the mere vulgar satisfaction which is experienced in the acquisition of money, in the exercise of power or in the frivolous pleasure of mere winning.

- Louis D. Brandeis

No law, written or unwritten, can be understood without a full knowledge of the facts out of which it arises, and to which it is to be applied.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Men long for an afterlife in which there apparently is nothing to do but delight in heaven's wonders.

- Louis D. Brandeis

In the field of modern business, so rich in opportunity for the exercise of man's finest and most varied mental faculties and moral qualities, mere money-making cannot be regarded as the legitimate end. Neither can mere growth of bulk or power be admitted as a worthy ambition. Nor can a man nobly mindful of his serious responsibilities to society view business as a game; since with the conduct of business human happiness or misery is inextricably interwoven.

- Louis D. Brandeis

In frank expression of conflicting opinion lies the greatest promise of wisdom in governmental action; and in suppression lies ordinarily the greatest peril.

- Louis D. Brandeis

In a government of laws, existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our Government is the potent, omnipresent teacher. For good or ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. If the Government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself.

- Louis D. Brandeis

In a democratic society the existence of large centers of private power is a dangerous to the continuing vitality of a free people.

- Louis D. Brandeis

If we would guide by the light of reason, we must let our minds be bold.

- Louis D. Brandeis

If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.

- Louis D. Brandeis

I live in Alexandria, Virginia. Near the Supreme Court chambers is a toll bridge across the Potomac. When in a rush, I pay the dollar toll and get home early. However, I usually drive outside the downtown section of the city and cross the Potomac on a free bridge. This bridge was placed outside the downtown Washington, DC area to serve a useful social service, getting drivers to drive the extra mile and help alleviate congestion during the rush hour. If I went over the toll bridge and through the barrier without paying the toll, I would be committing tax evasion. If, however, I drive the extra mile and drive outside the city of Washington to the free bridge, I am using a legitimate, logical and suitable method of tax avoidance, and am performing a useful social service by doing so. For my tax evasion, I should be punished. For my tax avoidance, I should be commended. The tragedy of life today is that so few people know that the free bridge even exists.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Full and free exercise of this right by the citizen is ordinarily also his duty; for its exercise is more important to the nation than it is to himself. Like the course of the heavenly bodies, harmony in national life is a resultant of the struggle between contending forces. In frank expression of conflicting opinion lies the greatest promise of wisdom in governmental action; and in suppression lies ordinarily the greatest peril.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burnt women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fears.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Constitutional rights should not be frittered away by arguments so technical and unsubstantial.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Behind every argument is someone's ignorance.

- Louis D. Brandeis

At the foundation of our civil liberty lies the principle which denies to government officials an exceptional position before the law and which subjects them to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen.

- Louis D. Brandeis

To declare that in the administration of criminal law the end justifies the means to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure conviction of a private criminal would bring terrible retribution.

- Louis D. Brandeis

There are no shortcuts in evolution.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Organisation can never be a substitute for initiative and for judgement.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.

- Louis D. Brandeis

Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done.

- Louis D. Brandeis