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Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (8 March 1841 – 6 March 1935) was an American jurist and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932; he was often called "The Great Dissenter", and was the son of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Quotes

 * There are not infrequent times when a bottle of wine, a good dinner, a girl of some trivial sort can fill the hour for me.
 * Letter to William James, as quoted in Henry James: The Untried Years: 1843-1870 (1953) by Leon Edel, p. 229.

1860s

 * Get down, you fool!
 * Assertion famously directed at then-President Abraham Lincoln when he came under enemy fire at Fort Stevens during the American Civil War, as quoted in Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (2005) by Doris Kearns Goodwin, p. 643.

1870s

 * But as precedents survive like the clavicle in the cat, long after the use they once served is at an end, and the reason for them has been forgotten, the result of following them must often be failure and confusion from the merely logical point of view.
 * "Common Carriers and the Common Law", 13 Am. Law Rev. 608, 630 (1879).

1880s

 * The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience... The law embodies the story of a nation's development through many centuries, and it cannot be dealt with as if it contained only the axioms and corollaries of a book of mathematics.
 * The Common Law (1881), p. 1.

 * The degree of civilization which a people has reached, no doubt, is marked by their anxiety to do as they would be done by.
 * Ibid., p. 44.

 * State interference is an evil, where it cannot be shown to be a good.
 * Ibid., p. 88-96.

In Our Youth Our Hearts Were Touched With Fire (1884)

 * "In Our Youth Our Hearts Were Touched With Fire", Memorial Day speech at Keene, New Hampshire, before John Sedgwick Post No. 4, Grand Army of the Republic (30 May 1884) reported in Holmes, Speeches (1934), p. 3.

 * It is now the moment when by common consent we pause to become conscious of our national life and to rejoice in it, to recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for the country in return.

 * I think that, as life is action and passion, it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not to have lived.

 * We know that, if the armies of our war did anything worth remembering, the credit belongs not mainly to the individuals who did it, but to average human nature. We also know very well that we cannot live in associations with the past alone, and we admit that, if we would be worthy of the past, we must find new fields for action or thought, and make for ourselves new careers. But, nevertheless, the generation that carried on the war has been set apart by its experience. Through our great good fortune, in our youth our hearts were touched with fire. It was given to us to learn at the outset that life is a profound and passionate thing. While we are permitted to scorn nothing but indifference, and do not pretend to undervalue the worldly rewards of ambition, we have seen with our own eyes, beyond and above the gold fields, the snowy heights of honor, and it is for us to bear the report to those who come after us.

1890s

 * As for us, our days of combat are over. Our swords are rust. Our guns will thunder no more. The vultures that once wheeled over our heads must be buried with their prey. Whatever of glory must be won in the council or the closet, never again in the field. I do not repine. We have shared the incommunicable experience of war; we have felt, we still feel, the passion of life to its top.
 * "The Soldier's Faith" Memorial Day address at Harvard University (30 May 1895).

 * The law, so far as it depends on learning, is indeed, as it has been called, the government of the living by the dead. To a very considerable extent no doubt it is inevitable that the living should be so governed. The past gives us our vocabulary and fixes the limits of our imagination; we cannot get away from it. There is, too, a peculiar logical pleasure in making manifest the continuity between what we are doing and what has been done before. But the present has a right to govern itself so far as it can; and it ought always to be remembered that historic continuity with the past is not a duty, it is only a necessity.
 * "Learning and Science", speech at a dinner of the Harvard Law School Association in honor of Professor C. C. Langdell (June 25, 1895); reported in Speeches by Oliver Wendell Holmes (1896). p. 67-68.

 * I always say you can get your tragedy of any desired length in England, from thirty seconds to a lifetime. I had one adorable one of twenty-nine minutes by the watch. At the end of that time I started for my train. Woman I'd had a glimpse of in London — walk. She sat on a style, I below her, gazing into her eyes — then, "remember this lane," "while memory holds its seat, etc." "Adieu." And I still do and ever shall remember her, and I rather think she does me a little bit. What imbecilities for an old fellow to be talking. But if one knows his place and makes way for younger men when he isn't sure, it is better perhaps not quite to abandon interest in the sports of life.
 * Letter to Sir Frederick Pollock (23 August 1895); reported in Holmes-Pollock Letters: The Correspondence of Mr. Justice Holmes and Sir Frederick Pollock (1961) edited by Mark De Wolfe Howe, Vol. 1, p. 60; also reported in The Mind and Faith of Justice Holmes: His Speeches, Essays, Letters, and Judicial Opinions (1954), p. 437.

 * Free competition is worth more to society than it costs.
 * Vegelahn v. Guntner, 167 Mass. 92, 44 N.E. 1077, 1080 (1896) (Supreme Court of Massachusetts, Holmes dissenting).

 * One of the eternal conflicts out of which life is made up is that between the effort of every man to get the most he can for his services, and that of society, disguised under the name of capital, to get his services for the least possible return.
 * Ibid.

 * Most of the things we do, we do for no better reason than that our fathers have done them or our neighbors do them, and the same is true of a larger part than what we suspect of what we think.
 * "The Path of the Law," Address to the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts at the dedication of the new hall of the Boston University School of Law (8 January 1897), published in Harvard Law Review, Vol. 10 (25 March 1897).

 * The aim of the law is not to punish sins, but is to prevent certain external results.
 * Commonwealth v. Kennedy, 170 Mass. 18, 20 (1897) (opinion of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts).

The Path of the Law (1897)

 * "The Path of the Law" 10 Harvard Law Review 457.

 * Certainty generally is illusion, and repose is not the destiny of man.

 * The advice of the elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.

 * For the rational study of the law the blackletter man may be the man of the present, but the man of the future is the man of statistics and the master of economics.

 * If you want to know the law and nothing else, you must look at it as a bad man, who cares only for the material consequences which such knowledge enables him to predict, not as a good one, who finds his reasons for conduct, whether inside the law or outside of it, in the vaguer sanctions of conscience.

 * When we study law we are not studying a mystery but a well-known profession. We are studying what we shall want in order to appear before judges, or to advise people in such a way as to keep them out of court. The reason why it is a profession, why people will pay lawyers to argue for them or to advise them, is that in societies like ours the command of the public force is intrusted to the judges in certain cases, and the whole power of the state will be put forth, if necessary, to carry out their judgments and decrees. People want to know under what circumstances and how far they will run the risk of coming against what is so much stronger than themselves, and hence it becomes a business to find out when this danger is to be feared. The object of our study, then, is prediction, the prediction of the incidence of the public force through the instrumentality of the courts.

1900s

 * The only simplicity for which I would give a straw is that which is on the other side of the complex — not that which never has divined it.
 * in a letter to Sir Frederick Pollock dated October 14, 1902
 * collected in "Holmes-Pollock Letters : The Correspondence of Mr. Justice Holmes and Sir Frederick Pollock, 1874-1932" (2nd ed., 1961), p. 109.
 * Often quoted as "I wouldn't give a fig for the simplicity on this side of complexity; I would give my right arm for the simplicity on the far side of complexity" and attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr..

 * One has to try to strike the jugular and let the rest go.
 * Speech on the death of Walbridge Abner Field, Chief Justice of Massachusetts (25 November 1899), reported in Speeches by Oliver Wendell Holmes (1900), p. 77.

 * Nature has but one judgment on wrong conduct — if you can call that a judgment which seemingly has no reference to conduct as such — the judgment of death.
 * Address at the dedication of the Northwestern University Law School Building, Chicago, Illinois (20 October 1902); republished in Holmes' Collected Legal Papers (1937), p. 272.

 * Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.
 * Reportedly first said by Holmes in a speech in 1904, alternately phrased as "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society, including the chance to insure", Compania General De Tabacos De Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue, 275 U.S. 87, 100, dissenting; opinion (21 November 1927). The first variation is quoted by the IRS above the entrance to their headquarters at 1111 Constitution Avenue.

 * Great cases like hard cases make bad law. For great cases are called great, not by reason of their importance in shaping the law of the future, but because of some accident of immediate overwhelming interest which appeals to the feelings and distorts the judgement.
 * Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U.S. 197, 400-401 (1904).

 * Constitutions are intended to preserve practical and substantial rights, not to maintain theories.
 * Davis v. Mills, 194 U.S. 451, 457 (1904).

 * I can't help preferring champagne to ditch water — I doubt if the universe does.
 * Letter to William James (24 March 1907); this was misquoted as "I happen to prefer champagne to ditchwater, but there is no reason to suppose that the cosmos does" in "Our Mission Statement" by William F. Buckley, Jr., in National Review (19 November 1955).

 * The great act of faith is when a man decides that he is not God.
 * Letter to William James (24 March 1907).

 * Philosophy may have gained by the attempts in recent years to look through the fiction to the fact and to generalize corporations, partnerships, and other groups into a single conception. But to generalize is to omit, and, in this instance, to omit one characteristic of the complete corporation, as called into being under modern statutes, that is most important in business and law.
 * Donnell v. Herring-Hall-Marvin Safe Co., 208 U.S. 267, 273 (1908).

 * The major premise of the conclusion expressed in a statute, the change of policy that induces the enactment, may not be set out in terms, but it is not an adequate discharge of duty for courts to say: We see what you are driving at, but you have not said it, and therefore we shall go on as before.
 * Johnson v. United States, 163 F. 30 (1st Cir. 1908) (Justice Holmes sitting by designation as a judge of the First Circuit).

 * Even a dog distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked.
 * "Early Forms of Liability," Lecture I from The Common Law. (1909).

Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 (1905)

 * Dissenting opinion.

 * Every opinion tends to become a law.
 * 198 U.S. at 75.

 * A Constitution is not intended to embody a particular economic theory . . . It is made for people of fundamentally differing views, and the accident of our finding certain opinions natural and familiar, or novel, and even shocking, ought not to conclude our judgment upon the question whether statutes embodying them conflict with the Constitution of the United States.
 * 198 U.S. at 76.

 * General propositions do not decide concrete cases.
 * 198 U.S. at 76.

 * The liberty of the citizen to do as he likes so long as he does not interfere with the liberty of others to do the same, which has been a shibboleth for some well known writers, is interfered with by school laws, by the Post Office, by every state or municipal institution which takes his money for purposes thought desirable, whether he likes it or not.
 * 198 U.S. at 79.

1910s

 * Now and then, an extraordinary case may turn up, but constitutional law, like other mortal contrivances, has to take some chances, and in the great majority of instances, no doubt, justice will be done.
 * Blinn v. Nelson, 222 U.S. 1, 7 (1911).

 * Life is painting a picture, not doing a sum.
 * Address to the Harvard Alumni Association to the Class of '61, in Speeches (1913), p. 96.

 * Life is a roar of bargain and battle, but in the very heart of it there rises a mystic spiritual tone that gives meaning to the whole. It transmutes the dull details into romance. It reminds us that our only but wholly adequate significance is as parts of the unimaginable whole. It suggests that even while living we are living to ends outside ourselves
 * Address to the Harvard Alumni Association to the Class of '61, in Speeches (1913), p. 96.

 * Life is action, the use of one's powers. As to use them to their height is our joy and duty, so it is the one end that justifies itself.
 * Speech to the Bar Association of Boston, in Speeches (1913), p. 85.

 * With all humility, I think, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." Infinitely more important than the vain attempt to love one's neighbor as one's self. If you want to hit a bird on the wing, you must have all your will in focus, you must not be thinking about yourself, and equally, you must not be thinking about your neighbor: you must be living in your eye on that bird. Every achievement is a bird on the wing.
 * Speech to the Bar Association of Boston, in Speeches (1913), p. 85.

 * Life is an end in itself, and the only question as to whether it is worth living is whether you have had enough of it.
 * Speech to the Bar Association of Boston, in Speeches (1913), p. 86.

 * It is urged in the first place that contempts cannot be crimes, because, although punishable by imprisonment, and therefore, if crimes, infamous, they are not within the protection of the Constitution and the Amendments giving a right to trial by jury, etc., to persons charged with such crimes. But the provisions of the Constitution are not mathematical formulas having their essence in their form; they are organic, living institutions transplanted from English soil. Their significance is vital, not formal; it is to be gathered not simply by taking the words and a dictionary, but by considering their origin and the line of their growth.
 * Gompers v. United States, 233 U.S. 604, 610 (1914).

 * Whatever disagreement there may be as to the scope of the phrase "due process of law" there can be no doubt that it embraces the fundamental conception of a fair trial, with opportunity to be heard.
 * Frank v. Magnum, 237 U.S. 309, 347 (1915).

 * The common law is not a brooding omnipresence in the sky, but the articulate voice of some sovereign or quasi sovereign that can be identified; although some decisions with which I have disagreed seem to me to have forgotten the fact.
 * Southern Pacific Company v. Jensen 244 U.S. 205, 222 (1917) (Holmes, J., dissenting; opinion published (21 May 1917).

 * A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged, it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used.
 * Towne vs. Eisner, 245 U.S. 418, 425 (7 January 1918).

 * The character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done.
 * Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 52 (3 March 1919).

 * The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic.
 * Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 52 (3 March 1919).

 * The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. It is a question of proximity and degree. When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right.
 * Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 52 (3 March 1919).

"Law and the Court" (1913)

 * "Law and the Court", Speech at a dinner of the Harvard Law School Association of New York, New York City (15 February 1913); published in Speeches by Oliver Wendell Holmes (1934), p. 102.

 * Vanity is the most philosophical of those feelings that we are taught to despise. For vanity recognizes that if a man is in a minority of one we lock him up, and therefore longs for an assurance from others that one's work has not been in vain.

 * As I grow older I grow calm. If I feel what are perhaps an old man's apprehensions, that competition from new races will cut deeper than working men's disputes and will test whether we can hang together or can fight.

 * I think it not improbable that man, like the grub that prepares a chamber for the winged thing it never has seen but is to be — that man may have cosmic destinies that he does not understand.

 * I do not think the United States would come to an end if we lost our power to declare an Act of Congress void. I do think the Union would be imperiled if we could not make that declaration as to the laws of the several States.

 * Most men think dramatically, not quantitatively, a fact that the rich would be wise to remember more than they do. We are apt to contrast the palace with the hovel, the dinner at Sherry's with the workingman's pail, and never ask how much or realize how little is withdrawn to make the prizes of success. (Subordinate prizes — since the only prize much cared for by the powerful is power. The prize of the general is not a bigger tent, but command.)

 * When twenty years ago a vague terror went over the earth and the word socialism began to be heard, I thought and still think that fear was translated into doctrines that had no proper place in the Constitution or the common law. Judges are apt to be naif, simple-minded men, and they need something of Mephistopheles. We too need education in the obvious—to learn to transcend our own convictions and to leave room for much that we hold dear to be done away with short of revolution by the orderly change of law.

"Natural Law", 32 Harvard Law Review 40, 41 (1918)

 * There is in all men a demand for the superlative, so much so that the poor devil who has no other way of reaching it attains it by getting drunk.

 * Our test of truth is a reference to either a present or an imagined future majority in favor of our view.

 * Certitude is not the test of certainty. We have been cocksure of many things that were not so.

 * Deep-seated preferences cannot be argued about — you cannot argue a man into liking a glass of beer — and therefore, when differences are sufficiently far reaching, we try to kill the other man rather than let him have his way. But that is perfectly consistent with admitting that, so far as appears, his grounds are just as good as ours.

Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616 (1919)

 * Dissenting opinion (10 November 1919).

 * That, at any rate, is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment.
 * 250 U.S. 616; 630.

 * It is only the present danger of immediate evil or an intent to bring it about that warrants Congress in setting a limit to the expression of opinion where private rights are not concerned.
 * 250 U.S. at 628.

 * To allow opposition by speech seems to indicate that you think the speech impotent, as when a man says that he has squared the circle, or that you do not care whole-heartedly for the result, or that you doubt either your power or your premises. But when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas —that the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out. That at any rate is the theory of our Constitution.
 * 250 U.S. at 630.

 * I think that we should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death, unless they so imminently threaten immediate interference with the lawful and pressing purposes of the law that an immediate check is required to save the country.
 * 250 U.S. at 630.

 * Only the emergency that makes it immediately dangerous to leave the correction of evil counsels to time warrants making any exception to the sweeping command, "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech."
 * 250 U.S. at 630-31.

1920s

 * I always say, as you know, that if my fellow citizens want to go to Hell I will help them. It's my job.
 * Letter to Harold Laski (4 March 1920); reported in Holmes-Laski Letters (1953) by Mark DeWolfe Howe, vol. 1, p. 249.

 * Men must turn square corners when they deal with the Government.
 * Rock Island C.R.R. v. United States, 254 U.S. 141, 143 (22 November 1920).

 * Detached reflection cannot be demanded in the presence of an uplifted knife.
 * Brown v. United States, 256 U.S. 335, 343 (16 May 1921).

 * A page of history is worth a volume of logic.
 * New York Trust Co. v. Eisner, 256 U.S. 345, 349 (1921).

 * If a thing has been practised for two hundred years by common consent, it will need a strong case for the Fourteenth Amendment to affect it.
 * Jackman v. Rosenbaum Co., 260 U.S. 22, 31 (1922).

 * The general rule, at least, is that while property may be regulated to a certain extent, if regulation goes too far it will be recognized as a taking.
 * Pennsylvania Coal Company v. H. J. Mahon, 260 U.S. 415, 415 (1922).

 * I confess that I do not understand the principle on which the power to fix a minimum for the wages of women can be denied by those who admit the power to fix a maximum for their hours of work. I fully assent to the proposition that here as elsewhere the distinctions of the law are distinctions of degree, but I perceive no difference in the kind or degree of interference with liberty, the only matter with which we have any concern, between the one case and the other. The bargain is equally affected whichever half you regulate…. It will need more than the Nineteenth Amendment to convince me that there are no differences between men and women, or that legislation cannot take those differences into account.
 * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., dissenting, Adkins, et al., Constituting the Minimum Wage Board of the District of Columbia, v. Children's Hospital of the District of Columbia; Same v. Lyons, 261 U.S. 569–70 (1923).

 * If I were dying, my last words would be, Have faith and pursue the unknown end.
 * Letter to John Ching Hsiung Wu (1924), published in Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: His Book Notices and Uncollected Letters and Papers (1936) by Harry Clair Shriver, p. 175.

 * Eloquence may set fire to reason.
 * Gitlow v. People of New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925) (dissenting).

 * If in the long run the beliefs expressed in proletarian dictatorship are destined to be accepted by the dominant forces of the community, the only meaning of free speech is that they should be given their chance and have their way.
 * Gitlow v. People of New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925) (dissenting).

 * We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concerned, in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind....Three generations of imbeciles are enough.
 * Writing for the Court, Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200, 207 (1927) (endorsing Virginia's eugenics program).

 * The power to tax is not the power to destroy while this Court sits.
 * Panhandle Oil Co. v. Mississippi ex rel. Knox, 277 U.S. 233 (1928).

 * Courts are apt to err by sticking too closely to the words of a law where those words import a policy that goes beyond them.
 * Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 469 (1928) (Holmes, J., dissenting).

 * Some of her answers might excite popular prejudice, but if there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought—not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.
 * United States v. Schwimmer, 279 U.S. 644 (1929) (Holmes, J., dissenting).

1930s

 * The elaborate argument against the constitutionality of the Act if interpreted as we read it, in accordance with its obvious meaning does not need an elaborate answer.
 * Writing for the Court, United States v. Wurzbach, 280 U.S. 396, 399 (1930).

 * Young man, the secret of my success is that at an early age I discovered that I was not God.
 * On his 90th birthday to a journalist (8 March 1931), as quoted in ''Information 2000: Library and Information Services for the 21st Century, Vol. 1991, Part 2 (1992) by the U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science, p. 272.

 * There are some men, who as they approach 70, read the Bible and prepare to die. Others prepare themselves to live to 90. It has been my observation that if a man prepares to live to 90, but dies at 70, no harm is done. If however, a man prepares to live to 70 but ends up dying at 90, then his last 20 years will be hell.

 * A river is more than an amenity, it is a treasure. It offers a necessity of life that must be rationed among those who have power over it.
 * Writing for the Court, New Jersey v. New York, et al., 283 U.S. 336, 342 (1931).

 * The interpretation of constitutional principles must not be too literal. We must remember that the machinery of government would not work if it were not allowed a little play in its joints.
 * Writing for the Court, Bain Peanut Co. v. Pinson, 282 U.S. 499, 501 (1931).

 * I have no respect for the passion of equality, which seems to me merely idealizing envy — I don't disparage envy but I don't accept it as legitimately my master.
 * Holmes-Laski Letters : The Correspondence of Mr. Justice Holmes and Harold J. Laski, 1916 - 1935 (1953), Vol. 2, p. 942.

Undated

 * A good catchword can obscure analysis for fifty years.
 * Quoted by Wendell Willkie during an America's Town Meeting of the Air broadcast, at The Town Hall in New York City, (6 January 1938).

Attributions

 * Lawyers spend their professional careers shoveling smoke.
 * Attributed in Watergate and the White House, Volumes 1-2 (1973) by Edward W. Knappman, p. 100; this has also become paraphrased as "Lawyers spend a great deal of their time shoveling smoke".

 * Gentlemen, to the lady without whom I should never have survived for eighty, nor sixty, nor yet thirty years. Her smile has been my lyric, her understanding, the rhythm of the stanza. She has been the spring wherefrom I have drawn the power to write the words. She is the poem of my life.
 * Attribution reported in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989), which states that this is not verified in works about him nor in Magnificent Yankee, the film about him. Holmes expressed a similar sentiment in a letter to Sir Frederick Pollock (May 24, 1929): "For sixty years she made life poetry for me". Mark De Wolfe Howe, ed., Holmes-Pollock Letters (1941), vol. 2, p. 243.

 * A second class mind, but a first class temperament.
 * A summation of his opinion of Theodore Roosevelt, indicated in various letters, but not recorded in so succinct a form; often incorrectly stated as his opinion of Franklin D. Roosevelt, as indicated in the p. xiv–xv Introduction to The Essential Holmes (1992), edited by Richard A. Posner.

Misattributed
Many quotes attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. were actually authored by his father, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., a popular author.
 * The mind of a bigot is like the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour upon it, the closer it contracts.
 * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., in "The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" in The New England Magazine, Vol. 1 (1831), p. 431.

 * Beware how you take away hope from any human being.
 * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., in his valedictory address to medical graduates at Harvard University (10 March 1858), published in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal Vol. LVIII, No. 8 (25 March 1858), p. 158; this has also been paraphrased "Beware how you take away hope from another human being".

 * A moment's insight is sometimes worth a lifetime's experience.
 * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., in "The Professor at the Breakfast-Table" in The Atlantic Monthly Vol. 4 (1859), p. 505.

 * Pretty much all the honest truth-telling there is in the world is done by children.
 * A paraphrase of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., in "The Poet at the Breakfast-Table" in The Atlantic Monthly Vol. 29 (1872), p. 231: "I like children, — he said to me one day at table. — I like 'em, and I respect 'em. Pretty much all the honest truth-telling there is in the world is done by them".

 * To be 70 years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be 40 years old.
 * Almost certainly attributable to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., who is, in various sources, credited with having said this in letters to Harriet Beecher Stowe (who turned 70 in 1881) and Julia Ward Howe (who turned 70 in 1889), as well as having made the commented about himself. Holmes, Sr. reached the age of 70 in 1879, while Holmes, Jr. reached that age in 1911, some time after the earliest reports of this quote.

 * A child's education should begin at least one hundred years before he was born.
 * More likely attributable to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

 * There is no friend like an old friend who has shared our morning days, no greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise.
 * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Kessinger Publishing (2005).

 * A man's mind stretched to a new idea never goes back to its original dimensions.
 * Also reported as "One's mind" instead of "A man's mind", and "can never go back" or "never regains" instead of "never goes back"; most likely properly attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

 * Old age is always fifteen years older than I am.
 * Actually by financier Bernard Baruch.

 * Your right to swing your arms ends just where the other man's nose begins.
 * Various permutations of this quote have been attributed to Holmes, but it was actually written by Zechariah Chafee, "Freedom of Speech in Wartime", 32 Harvard Law Review 932, 957 (1919).

 * Keep government poor and remain free.
 * Attributed to Holmes in a speech by Ronald Reagan (June 15,1982); reported as a misattribution by Paul F. Boller, Jr., and John George, They Never Said It: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, & Misleading Attributions (1989), p. 46-47.

 * The young man knows the rules, but the old man knows the exceptions.
 * Attributed in the Sioux City Journal (6 Jul 2008), p. A8
 * In fact, from a "Valedictory Address, delivered to the Graduating Class of the Bellevue Hospital College" in 1871 by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr, reprinted in the New York Medical Journal 13 (April 1871): 426.

 * Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions.
 * Often given as: A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.
 * Or: A mind that is stretched by a new idea can never go back to its old dimensions.
 * Actually by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Senior, from "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table", originally published in The Atlantic, September 1858.

Quotes about Holmes

 * While a judge of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, when he found the long-winded speeches of the lawyers especially trying, he advised them gravely to take a course of reading risque books, that they might learn to say things by innuendo.
 * Reported in Silas Bent, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes (1932), p. 16.

 * Holmes was exacting in construing a statute and latitudinarian in construing powers under the Constitution. He often said that there was nothing in the Constitution that prevented the country from going to hell if it chose to. But once a statute was clearly constitutional and it became a matter of construing it, Holmes put on his most scrupulous spectacles.
 * Max Lerner, The Mind and Faith of Justice Holmes, p. 222 (1954).

 * America is not broke. The very wealthy and hugely profitable corporations just aren't paying the taxes that, in the words of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes more than a century ago, "are the price we pay for a civilized society."
 * Bernie Sanders Our Revolution (2016)

 * An aristocrat in morals as in mind.
 * Owen Wister, Roosevelt: The Story of a Friendship (1930), p. 130.

title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.


text:
User:Marius~enwikiquote

I'm the same Marius of Wikipedia.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User:Marius~enwikiquote


text:
J. Irwin Miller

Joseph Irwin Miller (May 26, 1909 – August 19, 2004) was an American industrialist and patron of modern architecture. He was CEO of Cummins.

title: J. Irwin Miller


text:
User:Sirhoward

A recent arrival here. Full name is Sir Howard Lee of MSN,Opera,Charter,Netscape,formerly of Yahoo,ezboard and anyplace where he has an email address and where he spends his time on line.

title: User:Sirhoward


text:
The Andromeda Strain

The Andromeda Strain is a 1969 science-fiction novel by Michael Crichton about a team of scientists investigating the cause of a spaceborne disease that kills nearly everyone in a small desert town. They find an extraterrestrial form of life that causes rapid, fatal clotting of the blood, and make some disturbing discoveries about the project.

Quotes

 * On the cover of the file was stenciled WILDFIRE, and underneath, an ominous note: THIS FILE IS CLASSIFIED TOP SECRET. Examination by unauthorized access is a criminal offense punishable by fines and imprisonment up to 20 years and $20,000.  When Leavitt gave him the file, Hall had read the note and whistled. "Don't you believe it," Leavitt said. "Just a scare?" "Scare, hell," Leavitt said. "If the wrong man reads this file, he just disappears."
 * Day 2: Piedmont; Chapter 9: Flatrock

 * For years it was stated that men had forty-eight chromosomes in their cells; there were pictures to prove it, and any number of careful studies. In 1953, a group of American researchers announced to the world that the human chromosome number was forty-six. Once more, there were pictures to prove it, and studies to confirm it. But these researchers also went back to reexamine the old pictures, and the old studies — and found only forty-six chromosomes, not forty-eight. Leavitt's Rule of 48 said simply, "All Scientists Are Blind."
 * Day 3: Wildfire; Chapter 12: The Conference

 * Houston: Scoop, Houston Projection Group has confirmed orbital instability and decay ratios are now being passed by the data trunk to your station. Scoop: How do they look, Houston? Houston: Bad. Scoop: Not understood. Please repeat. Houston: Bad: B as in broken, A as in awful, D as in dropping.
 * Day 3: Wildfire; Chapter 12: The Conference
 * Recorded dialog between NASA Houston and Scoop Control about the apparently malfunctioning Scoop VII satellite.

 * As Stone was fond of saying, scientific research was much like prospecting: you went out and you hunted, armed with your maps and your instruments, but in the end your preparations did not matter, or even your intuition. You needed your luck, and whatever benefits accrued to the diligent, through sheer, grinding hard work.
 * Day 3: Wildfire; Chapter 20: Routine

 * He [Stone] often argued that human intelligence was more trouble than it was worth. It was more destructive than creative, more confusing than revealing, more discouraging than satisfying, more spiteful than charitable.
 * Day 3: Wildfire; Chapter 20: Routine

 * The biologist R. A. Janek has said that "increasing vision is increasingly expensive." He meant by this that any machine to enable men to see finer or fainter details increased in cost faster than it increased in resolving power.
 * Day 4: Spread; Chapter 22: The Analysis

title: The Andromeda Strain


text:
A Few Good Men

A Few Good Men is a 1992 film about the trial of two U.S. Marines accused of murder while serving at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
 * Directed by Rob Reiner. Written by Aaron Sorkin, based on his play of the same name.

In the heart of the nation's capital, in a courthouse of the U.S. government, one man will stop at nothing to keep his honor, and one will stop at nothing to find the truth. (taglines)

Lieutenant Junior Grade Daniel Kaffee

 * I want you to know that I think the whole fucking bunch of you are certifiably insane. This code of honor of yours makes me want to beat the shit out of somebody.

Colonel Nathan R. Jessup

 * We're in the business of saving lives, Matthew. That is a responsibility that I think we have to take pretty seriously. And I believe that taking a Marine who's not quite up to the job and shipping him off to some other assignment puts lives in danger. [Markinson rises to leave] Sit down, Matthew. We go back a while. We went to the Academy together, we were commissioned together, we did our tours in Vietnam together. But I've been promoted up the chain with greater speed and success than you have. Now, if that's a source of tension or embarrassment for you, I don't give a shit. We're in the business of saving lives, Lt. Col. Markinson. Don't ever question my orders in front of another officer.

 * I run my unit how I run my unit. You want to investigate me, roll the dice and take your chances. I eat breakfast 300 yards from 4000 Cubans who are trained to kill me, so don't think for one second that you can come down here, flash a badge, and make me nervous.

 * There is nothing on this earth sexier, believe me, gentlemen, than a woman you have to salute in the morning. Promote 'em all, I say, because this is true: if you haven't gotten a blow-job from a superior officer, well, you're just letting the best in life pass you by. 'Course, my problem is, I'm a colonel, so I guess I'll just have to keep taking cold showers until they elect some gal president.

 * [to Galloway] Take caution in your tone, Commander. I'm a fair guy, but this fucking heat is making me absolutely crazy.

Dialogue

 * Jessup: Who the fuck is Pfc. William T. Santiago?
 * Kendrick: Private Santiago is a member of Second Platoon Bravo.
 * Jessup: Apparently he's not very happy down here in Shangri-la because he's written letters to everyone but Santa Claus asking for a transfer and now he's telling tales about a fence line shooting, Matthew?
 * Markinson: I'm appalled, sir.
 * Jessup: You're "appalled". This kid broke the chain of command and ratted on a member of his unit. To say nothing of the fact that he is a US Marine, and it would appear that he can't run from here to there without collapsing from heat exhaustion. What the fuck is going on in Bravo Company?
 * Markinson: Colonel, I think it would be better to hold this discussion in private.
 * Kendrick: That won't be necessary, I can handle the situation.
 * Markinson: The same way you handled the Curtis Bell incident? [Kendrick starts to speak] Don't interrupt me, Lieutenant! I'm still your superior officer.
 * Jessup: [to Markinson] And I am yours, Matthew. I want to know what we're going to do about this.
 * Markinson: I think Santiago should be transferred off the base immediately.
 * Jessup: He's that bad, huh?
 * Markinson: Not only that, but word of this letter's bound to get out. Kid's gonna get his ass whipped.
 * Jessup: Hmm... Transfer Santiago? Yes, I'm sure you're right. I'm sure that's the thing to do. Wait, I've got a better idea. Let's transfer the whole squad off the base. On second thought, Windward. Let's transfer the whole Windward Division off the base. John, tell those boys to get down off the fence. They're packing their bags. [calling out to his assistant] Tom?
 * Tom: [Enters office] Sir?
 * Jessup: Get me the President on the phone. We're surrendering our position in Cuba.
 * Tom: Yes, sir. [starts to leave office]
 * Jessup: Wait a minute, Tom. Don't get the President yet. Maybe we should consider this for a second. Dismissed, Tom.
 * Tom: Yes, sir. [Departs office]
 * Col. Jessup: Maybe, and I'm just spit balling here, maybe, we have a responsibility as officers to train Santiago. Maybe we as officers have a responsibility to this country to see that the men and women charged with its security are trained professionals. Yes, I'm certain that I read that somewhere once. And now I'm thinking, Colonel Markinson, that your suggestion of transferring Santiago, while expeditious and certainly painless, might not be, in a matter of speaking, the American way. Santiago stays where he is. We're gonna train the lad!

 * Kaffee: It had to be Professor Plum, in the library, with the candlestick.
 * Galloway: I'm gonna talk to your supervisor.
 * Kaffee: Go straight up the Pennsylvania Avenue. It's the big white house with the pillars.
 * Galloway: Thank you.
 * Kaffee: I don't think you'll have much luck though.

 * [after hearing a reference to Danny's father]
 * Col. Jessup: Lionel Kaffee?
 * Danny: Yes, sir.
 * Col. Jessup: Well, what do you know? [to Kendrick] This man's dad once made a lot of enemies in your neck of the woods. Jefferson v. Madison County School District. Folks down there said a little black girl couldn't go to an all-white school. Lionel Kaffee said, "Well, we'll just see about that." How the hell is your dad, Danny?
 * Danny: He passed away seven years ago, sir.
 * [beat]
 * Jessup: Don't I feel like the fucking asshole.
 * Danny: Not at all, sir.

 * Kaffee: Colonel, I'll just need a copy of Santiago's transfer order.
 * Jessup: What's that?
 * Kaffee: Santiago's transfer order. You guys have paperwork on that kind of thing, I just need it for the file.
 * Jessup: For the file...
 * Kaffee: Yeah.
 * Jessup: [pause] Of course you can have a copy of the transfer order. For the file. I'm here to help anyway I can.
 * Kaffee: Thank you.
 * Jessup: You believe that, don't you? Danny? That I'm here to help in anyway I can?
 * Kaffee: Of course.
 * Jessup: The Corporal will take you by Personnel on your way back to the flight line and you can have all the transfer orders you want.
 * Kaffee: [to Weinberg & Galloway] Let's go.
 * Jessup: But you have to ask me nicely.
 * Kaffee: I beg your pardon?
 * Jessup: You have to ask me nicely. You see, Danny, I can deal with the bullets and the bombs and the blood, ask around. I don't want money and I don't want medals. What I do want is for you to stand there in your faggoty white uniform and your Harvard mouth and extend me some fucking courtesy! You gotta ask me nicely.
 * [a beat, as Kaffee swallows his disbelief]
 * Kaffee: Colonel Jessup, if it's not too much trouble, I'd like a copy of the transfer order, sir.
 * Jessup: [politely, and with a triumphant smile] No problem.

 * Kaffee: Oh, Harold? You see what I'm getting at? If Santiago didn't have anything on you... why did you give him a Code Red?
 * Dawson: He broke the chain of command, sir.
 * Kaffee: I'm sorry, he what?
 * Dawson: He went outside of his unit.
 * Kaffee: Harold, I can't be hearing this right. He what?
 * Dawson: [with a challenging look] He went outside of his unit, sir.

 * Dawson: After six months we'll be dishonorably discharged. Right, sir?
 * Kaffee: Probably.
 * Dawson: Well, what do we do then, sir? We joined the Marines because we wanted to live our lives by a certain code and we found it in the Corps. Now you're asking us to sign a piece of paper that says we have no honor. You're asking us to say that we're not Marines. If a court decides that what we did was wrong, then I'll accept whatever punishment they give. I believe I was right. I believe I did my job. But I will not dishonor MYSELF, MY UNIT, OR THE CORPS SO THAT I CAN GO HOME IN SIX MONTHS! Sir.

 * Capt. Ross: You have proof?
 * Kaffee: I have the defendants.
 * Capt. Ross: And I have 23 Marines and a lieutenant with four letters of commendation.
 * Kaffee: Why did Markinson go U.A.?
 * Capt. Ross: We'll never know.
 * Kaffee: Wait, I can't subpoena Markinson?
 * Capt. Ross: You can try, but you won't find him. You know what Markinson did for 17 years? Counterintelligence. Markinson's gone. There is no Markinson.

 * Weinberg: I strenuously object? Is that how it works? Objection. Overruled! No, no, no... I strenuously object! Oh, I should reconsider then!
 * Galloway: I got it on the record.
 * Weinberg: You got the court thinking we're afraid of the doctor. Christ, you even had the judge saying he was an expert! You object once, so we can say he's not a criminologist. You keep after it, our cross looks like a bunch of fancy lawyer tricks. It's the difference between paper law and trial law!
 * [...]
 * Galloway: Why do you hate them so much?
 * Weinberg: They beat up on a weakling. The rest of this is just smoke-filled-coffeehouse crap. They tortured and tormented a weaker kid! They didn't like him. So? They killed him. And why? Because he couldn't run very fast!
 * [...]
 * Weinberg: [turning back to face Galloway] Why do you like them so much?
 * Galloway: [with a confident tone] Because they stand on a wall and say, "Nothing's gonna hurt you tonight. Not on my watch."

 * [on whether or not they should call Col. Jessup to testify]
 * Galloway: He ordered the Code Red!
 * Kaffee: [sarcastically] He did? Well, that's great! Why didn't you say so? And of course, you have proof of this, right? Oh, I'm sorry, I keep forgetting, you were sick the day they taught law in law school!

 * Kaffee: I think my father would've enjoyed seeing me graduate from law school. I think he would've liked that an awful lot.
 * Weinberg: I ever tell you I wrote a paper about your father in college?
 * Kaffee: Yeah?
 * Weinberg: One of the best trial lawyers ever.
 * Kaffee: Yes; he was.
 * Weinberg: ... and if I were Dawson or Downey and I had a choice between you or your father to represent me in this case, I'd choose you any day of the week and twice on Sunday. You should've seen yourself thunder away at Kendrick.
 * Kaffee: Would you put Jessup on the stand?
 * Weinberg: No.
 * Kaffee: You think my father would've?
 * Weinberg: With the evidence we got? Not in a million years. But here's the thing and there's really no getting around this: neither Lionel Kaffee nor Sam Weinberg are lead counsel in the matter of US versus Dawson and Downey. So there's really only one question: what would you do?

 * [Col. Jessup chuckles while on the witness stand]
 * Kaffee: You think this funny?
 * Col. Jessup: [face falls to a look of disgust] No, it isn't. It's tragic.
 * Kaffee: Do you have an answer to the question, Colonel?
 * Col. Jessup: Absolutely. My answer is I don't have the first damn clue. Maybe he was an early riser and liked to pack in the morning. And maybe he didn't have any friends. I'm an educated man, but I'm afraid I can't speak intelligently about the travel habits of William Santiago. What I do know is that he was set to leave the base at 0600. Now, are these really the questions I was called here to answer? Phone calls and foot lockers? Please tell me that you have something more, Lieutenant. These two Marines are on trial for their lives. Please tell me their lawyer hasn't pinned their hopes to a phone bill.
 * [Kaffee hesitates, dumbfounded]
 * Col. Jessup: Do you have any more questions for me, Counselor?
 * Judge Randolph: Lt. Kaffee? [pause] Lieutenant, do you have anything further for this witness?
 * [Jessup defiantly gets up to leave the courtroom]
 * Col. Jessup: Thanks, Danny. I love Washington.
 * Kaffee: Excuse me. I didn't dismiss you.
 * Col. Jessup: I beg your pardon?
 * Kaffee: I'm not through with my examination. Sit down.
 * Col. Jessup: Colonel.
 * Kaffee: What's that?
 * Col. Jessup: I would appreciate it if he would address me as "Colonel" or "sir." I believe I've earned it.
 * Judge Randolph: Defense counsel will address the witness as "Colonel" or "sir."
 * Col. Jessup: [to Judge] I don't know what the hell kind of unit you're running here.
 * Judge Randolph: And the witness will address this court as "Judge" or "your Honor." I'm quite certain I've earned it. Take your seat, Colonel.

 * Kaffee: A moment ago, you said that you ordered Lt. Kendrick to tell his men that Santiago wasn't to be touched.
 * Jessup: That's right.
 * Kaffee: And Lt. Kendrick was clear on what you wanted?
 * Jessup: Crystal.
 * Kaffee: Any chance Lt. Kendrick ignored the order?
 * Jessup: Ignored the order?
 * Kaffee: Any chance he forgot about it?
 * Jessup: No.
 * Kaffee: Any chance Lt. Kendrick left your office and said, "the old man is wrong"?
 * Jessup: No.
 * Kaffee: When Lt. Kendrick spoke to the platoon and ordered them not to touch Santiago, any chance they ignored him?
 * Jessup: You ever served in an infantry unit, son?
 * Kaffee: No, sir.
 * Jessup: Ever served in a forward area?
 * Kaffee: No, sir.
 * Jessup: Ever put your life in another man's hands and asked him to put his life in yours?
 * Kaffee: No, sir.
 * Jessup: We follow orders, son. We follow orders or people die. It's that simple. Are we clear?
 * Kaffee: Yes, sir.
 * Jessup: Are we clear?!
 * Kaffee: Crystal. Colonel, I just have one more question before I put Airman O'Malley and Airman Rodriguez on the stand. If you gave an order that Santiago wasn't to be touched, and your orders are always followed, then why would Santiago be in danger? Why would it be necessary to transfer him off the base?
 * [Jessup hesitates]
 * Jessup: Santiago was a substandard Marine. He was being transferred...
 * Kaffee: That's not what you said. You said he was being transferred, because he was in grave danger.
 * Jessup: That's correct.
 * Kaffee: You said he was in danger. I said "grave danger"? You said...
 * Jessup: I recall what I said.
 * Kaffee: I could have the court reporter read back to you...
 * Jessup: I know what I said! I don't have to have it read back to me, like I'm...
 * Kaffee: Then why the two orders? Colonel?
 * Jessup: [hesitates] Sometimes men take matters into their own hands.
 * Kaffee: No, sir. You made it clear just a moment ago that your men never take matters into their own hands. Your men follow orders or people die. So Santiago shouldn't have been in any danger at all, should he have, Colonel?
 * Jessup: You snotty little bastard.
 * Ross: Your Honor, I'd like to ask for a recess.
 * Kaffee: I'd like an answer to the question, Judge.
 * Judge Randolph: The court will wait for an answer.
 * Kaffee: If Lieutenant Kendrick gave an order that Santiago wasn't to be touched, then why did he have to be transferred? Colonel? Lieutenant Kendrick ordered the Code Red, didn't he? Because that's what you told Lieutenant Kendrick to do!
 * Ross: Objection!
 * Kaffee: And when it went bad, you cut these guys loose!
 * Ross: Your Honor--
 * Kaffee: You had Markinson sign a phony transfer order, and you doctored the log book!
 * Ross: Damn it, Kaffee!
 * Kaffee: You coerced the doctor!
 * Judge Randolph: Consider yourself in contempt!
 * Kaffee: Now I'm asking you!
 * Kaffee: Colonel Jessup! Did you order the Code Red?!
 * Judge Randolph: You don't have to answer that question!
 * Jessup: I'll answer the question. You want answers?
 * Kaffee: I think I'm entitled to it!
 * Jessup: You want answers?!
 * Kaffee: I WANT THE TRUTH!!
 * Jessup: You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives! You don't want the truth, because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall. We use words like "honor", "code", "loyalty". We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline! I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then QUESTIONS the manner in which I provide it! I would rather you just said "thank you", and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think you are entitled to!
 * Kaffee: Did you order the Code Red?
 * Jessup: I did the job that—-
 * Kaffee: DID YOU ORDER THE CODE RED?!
 * Jessup: YOU'RE GODDAMN RIGHT I DID!
 * The bolded portion is ranked #29 in the American Film Institute's list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema.

 * Col. Jessup: [Judge dismisses the jury] What is this? Colonel, what's going on? I did my job, I'd do it again! [stands up defiantly] I'm gonna get on a plane and go on back to my base.
 * Judge Randolph: You're not going anywhere, Colonel. MPs... guard the Colonel!
 * Marine MP: Yes, sir.
 * [MPs take post]
 * Judge Randolph: Captain Ross?
 * Col. Jessup: What the hell is this?
 * Capt. Ross: Colonel Jessup, you have the right to remain silent. Any statement you make...
 * Col. Jessup: [while Ross continues reading his rights] I'm being charged with a crime? Is that what this is? I'm being charged with a crime? This is funny. That's what this is. This is... [turns to Kaffee and lunges at him while MPs hold him back] I'm gonna rip the eyes out of your head and piss into your dead skull! You fucked with the wrong Marine!
 * Capt. Ross: Colonel Jessup, do you understand these rights as I have just read them to you?
 * Col. Jessup: You fuckin' people. You have no idea how to defend a nation. All you did was weaken a country today, Kaffee. That's all you did. You put people's lives in danger. Sweet dreams, son.
 * Kaffee: Don't call me "son". I'm a lawyer, and an officer in the United States Navy. And you're under arrest, you son of a bitch. The witness is excused.

 * Downey: I don't understand... Colonel Jessup said he ordered the Code Red.
 * Galloway: I know, but...
 * Downey: Colonel Jessup said he ordered the Code Red! What did we do wrong?
 * Galloway: It's not that simple...
 * Downey: What did we do wrong? We did nothing wrong!
 * Dawson: Yeah, we did. We were supposed to fight for people who couldn't fight for themselves. We were supposed to fight for Willie.

 * Kaffee: Harold?
 * Dawson: Sir?
 * Kaffee: You don't need a patch on your arm to have honor.
 * Dawson: [Salutes] Ten-hut! There's an officer on deck!

Taglines

 * In the heart of the nation's capital, in a courthouse of the U.S. government, one man will stop at nothing to keep his honor, and one will stop at nothing to find the truth.

Cast

 * Tom Cruise - Lt. Daniel Kaffee
 * Demi Moore - Lt. Cmdr. Joanne Galloway
 * Jack Nicholson - Col. Nathan R. Jessup
 * Kevin Bacon - Capt. Jack Ross
 * Kiefer Sutherland - Lt. Jonathan Kendrick
 * J.T. Walsh - Lt. Col. Matthew Markinson
 * Kevin Pollak - Lt. (j.g.) Sam Weinberg
 * James Marshall - Pfc. Louden Downey
 * Matt Craven - Lt. Dave Spradling
 * Wolfgang Bodison - Lance Cpl. Harold W. Dawson
 * J.A. Preston - Judge Julius Alexander Randolph
 * Noah Wyle - Cpl. Jeffrey Barnes
 * Cuba Gooding Jr. - Cpl. Carl Hammaker
 * John M. Jackson - Capt. West
 * Xander Berkeley - Capt. Whitaker
 * Joshua Malina - Tom
 * Christopher Guest - Dr. Stone
 * Aaron Sorkin - Lawyer bragging in tavern

title: A Few Good Men


text:
Hancock's Half Hour

Hancock's Half Hour (1954–61) is a BBC sitcom, on radio and later television, written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson. It starred Tony Hancock with Sid James; the radio version also co-starred Bill Kerr and Kenneth Williams and, for periods during the run, Moira Lister, Andrée Melly, and Hattie Jacques. In his final BBC television series, renamed as Hancock, he was the only regular performer.

Tony Hancock

 * Stone me!
 * [having emphatically disagreed with someone] He's right you know...
 * Eyes down for a full house.

Bill Kerr

 * Hiya Tubb!

Sid James

 * Hello boys! What can I do for you?

'Snide' (recurring Kenneth Williams character)

 * No, stop messing about!
 * Go on, be a devil!
 * Ooh, you are rotten.

The First Night Party [1.1]
[first lines]
 * Announcer: Yes, this is the first night of the Lad's new radio series. Such occasions are usually marked by a small celebration of some sort, but Tony Hancock is really doing it in style - he's going to throw a cocktail and dinner party, so let's go over to Tony's flat in the English quarter of London's West End, where he and Bill Kerr are making the arrangements.
 * Hancock: [slow typewriter sounds] Hurry up, Kerr. Haven't you finished typing out those invitations yet?
 * Bill Kerr: Don't rush me, don't rush me.
 * Hancock: Might help if you took the gloves off...
 * Bill Kerr: My hands are cold. [pause] Anyway, what's wrong with typing in gloves? [pause] I like typing in gloves. [pause] Lots of people type in gloves.
 * Hancock: Not in boxing gloves.

The Marrow Contest [2.11]

 * Usher: The court is now in session! Case of the Crown versus Hancock's Marrow, round two. Presiding judge Lord Chief Justice Fleming.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: There are one or two points in this case that I should like to elucidate. Will Mayor James please stand up?
 * Sid James: Mornin' judge.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: Your face is familiar! Haven't I seen you here before?
 * Sid James: Yes, Your Honour. Three times, all told.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: Really?
 * Sid James: Yes. A six months, a not proven and a warning.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: Well now, you wish to build a road through Mr Hancock's garden?
 * Sid James: That's it.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: And he won't let you because he's got a marrow growing there.
 * Sid James: That's right.
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: Yes. Hmm. Yes. What is a marrow?
 * Sid James: Eh?
 * Lord Chief Justice Fleming: I always ask that. It gets me in the newspapers.

The Alpine Holiday [2.1]

 * Fellow Passenger: Windows on aeroplanes do not open. This is a pressurised cabin - if the windows opened the plane would explode!
 * Hancock: Well that's bad workmanship, old man.

 * Hancock: Well the Hun was throwing everything at me, three on my tail, I was looping the loop at a hundred and twenty miles an hour. Only one thing to do: I stepped out on the wing, controlling the plane with my feet, grabbed the bombs out of the racks and threw 'em at him! Did my victory roll over Hendon airport picking up handkerchiefs off the tarmac with my wing tips.

 * Hancock: This one nearer the window has the best view of the Swiss mountain scenery, which is the reason I'm here. Yes, this'll do. On the other hand, bloke in that bed gets his breakfast in bed first. Well, when you've seen one mountain you've seen the lot.

The New Secretary [4.5]
Hancock's secretary has swapped two letters, potentially ending his career.
 * Hancock: Miss Pugh? I have reason to believe you've put one of your dainty plates in it again...

The Wild Man of the Woods [4.16]
Hancock has an announcement to make.
 * Bill Kerr: Can't we have the proclamation without the press?
 * Hancock: No, what I have to say concerns the world.
 * [door knock]
 * Hancock: Ah, mayhap that these are they...

 * Hancock: There is no happiness in this world today for a man of my intellect. So, I've decided the only solution is to become a recluse. I'm going back to nature! I'm going to renounce all my worldly goods and live in the woods...
 * Sid James: Where?
 * Hancock: Clapham Common. It's the easy living and false comforts of modern civilisation that are ruining mankind.
 * Reporter: Why have you picked Clapham Common?
 * Hancock: So I'll be near the shops.

 * Hancock: I am leaving this house, leaving society. I shall become a hermit.
 * Reporter: But, er, what are you going to live on Mr Hancock?
 * Hancock: Nature is bountiful, young man! I will eat the food she has provided! Berries, herbs, grass... he's right you know, what am I going to live on?

 * Hancock: I shall write poetry.
 * Bill: You don't mean that rubbish you scribble down in your diary every day?
 * Hancock: Rubbish? Rubbish? Philosophical gems, matey! Listen to this: Sonnet, by A. H.
 * Oh wond'rous moon with silvery sheen!
 * Who throws its light upon East Cheam
 * From lofty height, and through the mist
 * Two o'clock Friday, chiropodist.
 * How did that get in?! Where's the last line of my poem?
 * Griselda Pugh: I rubbed it out to make room for the chiropodist appointment. You know you can't get your boots on if you leave your corns for more than a week!

Hancock is being exploited as a tourist attraction by Sid, as The Wild Man of the Woods.
 * Hancock: I refuse to make a public exhibition of myself!
 * Bill: Hey! Hey Sid, look! What's that up there in the trees?
 * Sid: Ah nothing, probably a squirrel or something, now look, Hancock—
 * Bill: No, no it's not a sirrel S— [cast and audience descend into giggles]
 * Hancock: ... if Mr Kerr will say "it's not a sirrel Squid", then...

Air Steward Hancock [3.5]

 * Burly Plain-Clothes Policeman: How did you know we were policemen?
 * Hancock: I, er... I looked it up on the passenger list. I should never have known otherwise, you could be anybody: Cabinet Ministers or Italian footballers or Sadler's Wells ballet...

 * Sid James: The plane is still on the ground.
 * Hancock: So it is, so it is! Good grief, I'd better tell the pilot before he pulls the wheels up!

The Crown v James, S. [3.9]

 * Sir Jasper Worthington, Q.C.: Tell me Hancock, where did you study law?
 * Hancock: LCC evening classes, Sir. Second class diploma and nine out of ten for woodwork.

 * Hancock: Well, it was a mistake anybody could make.
 * Sir Jasper Worthington, Q.C.: A mistake? An important murder case and you turn up at the wrong court! You spend three hours making an impassioned plea for a life sentence on a man accused of passing betting slips in Hyde Park!

 * Hancock: How dare you! I shall sue you for libel!
 * Sir Jasper Worthington, Q.C.: Don't you mean 'slander'?
 * Hancock: Do I? Hang on a minute, no I don't, you can't catch me - 'slander' is setting fire to people.

Competitions: How To Win Money and Influence People [3.10]

 * Hancock: "Place in order the six best looking photographs of Jimmy Edwards." None of 'em much good here, are they? Still, if you haven't got the clay you can't make the pot...

 * Hancock: You remember that nine hundred thousand pounds I won?
 * Sid James: Oh yeah.
 * Hancock: Well I want two bob of it - I'm hungry!
 * Sid James: Hancock, we've been all over this before, boy - it's all tied up.
 * Hancock: I know it is! In little bags in your bedroom!

The Male Suffragettes [5.3]

 * Hancock: When you were a boy weren't you ever taught table manners?
 * Bill Kerr: No.
 * Hancock: Why not?
 * Bill Kerr: We didn't have a table.

 * Hancock: Well well, look who it is. The Thing from Outer Kitchen. I gather from the clouds of blue smoke the sausages are ready?
 * Griselda Pugh: I'm employed as a secretary, not to provide breakfast for you two as soon as I get here. If you don't like my cooking, do it yourself. Here you are. [clatter]
 * Hancock: What are these then?
 * Griselda Pugh: Sausages!
 * Hancock: What, these little shrivelled up things with two black knobs on each end?
 * Griselda Pugh: They burst out of their skin.
 * Hancock: And pleased to get out, by the looks of things!

 * Hancock: I can't eat these, even if I wanted to I couldn't. You'd need a pair of nutcrackers to break these open.
 * Bill Kerr: I'll have yours, Tubb, if you don't want them.
 * Hancock: Here we are, the old waste bucket 'ere. I'm sure if you trod on his foot the top of his head would fly open.

Sunday Afternoon at Home [5.14]

 * Griselda Pugh: Ooh look! It's started raining!
 * Hancock: That's all we wanted. You watch, it'll go dark in a minute, we'll have to switch the lights on. I think I'll go to bed.
 * Griselda Pugh: [reproachfully] You've only been up an hour...
 * Hancock: That is by the way and nothing to do with it. I might just as well be in bed, there's nothing else to do. I wish I hadn't got up now. Your dinner wasn't worth getting up for, I'll tell you that for a start!
 * Griselda Pugh: Well I don't know, I ate all mine.
 * Hancock: That is neither here nor there. You also ate Bill's, and Sid's, and mine! I thought my mother was a bad cook but at least her gravy used to move about. Yours just sort of lies there and sets.
 * Griselda Pugh: That's the goodness in it!
 * Hancock: That's the half a pound of flour you put in it!

 * Kenneth Williams (Clark): Not a very nice afternoon, is it?
 * Hancock: No.
 * Kenneth Williams (Clark): It's raining you know.
 * Hancock: [sarcastically] Oh so that's what's making the roads wet.

Lord Byron Lived Here [5.3]

 * "I wish I were a chestnut tree,
 * a-nourished by the sun,
 * with twigs and leaves and branches,
 * and conkers by the ton."

Twelve Angry Men [5.4]

 * Hancock: Does Magna Carta mean nothing to you? Did she die in vain? That brave Hungarian peasant girl who forced King John to sign the pledge at Runnymede and close the boozers at half past ten? Is all this to be forgotten?

The Missing Page [6.2]

 * Hancock: One can rush one's savouring of the classics of world literature - Rome was not built in a day and its decline and fall cannot be read in one.
 * Librarian: But you haven't got Gibbon's Decline and Fall there.
 * Hancock: That's got nothing to do with it - I've got The Love Lives of the Caesars here and that tells me everything!

 * Hancock is reading.
 * Hancock: Do you mind? I'm trying to read, don't interrupt! I'm on the edge of me seat here.
 * Sid James: Good, is it?
 * Hancock: Good? This is red hot, this is, mate. I'd hate to think of a book like this getting in the wrong hands. As soon as I've finished this I shall recommend they ban it.

The Blood Donor [7.5]

 * Hancock: You've got Adam Faith earning ten times more than the prime minister. Now, is that right? Is that right? ... Then again, it depends whether you like Adam Faith and what your politics are.

 * Hancock: Do we get a badge for doing this?

 * Hancock: [to woman going to give blood] Just think, Cliff Richard might get some of yours! [to himself] That'll slow him down a bit...

 * Doctor: Where are you going?
 * Hancock: To have my tea and biscuits.
 * Doctor: I thought you came here to give some of your blood!
 * Hancock: You've just had it.
 * Doctor: But this is just a smear!
 * Hancock: It may be just a smear to you, mate, but it's life and death to some poor wretch!

 * Hancock: How much do you want then?
 * Doctor: Well, a pint, of course?
 * Hancock: A pint? Have you gone raving mad? [...] I mean, I came here in all good faith, to help my country. I don't mind giving a reasonable amount, but a pint? Why, that's very nearly an armful!

 * Doctor: You're AB negative.
 * Hancock: ...Is that bad?
 * Doctor: No, no - you're rhesus positive.
 * Hancock: Rhesus?! They're monkeys, aren't they? How dare you! What are you implying? I didn't come here to be insulted by a legalised vampire!

title: Hancock's Half Hour