Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Compania General de Tabacos de Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. Dissenting Opinion. Compania de Tabacos de Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue. United States Reports, vol. 275, 21 Nov. 1927, pp. 99-101. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/275/87/.

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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.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

United States v. Schwimmer

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. Dissenting Opinion. United States v. Schwimmer. United States Reports, vol. 279, 27 May 1929, pp. 653-655. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/279/644/.

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Life is painting a picture, not doing a sum.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "The Class of '61." Fiftieth Anniversary of Graduation of the Harvard Class of 1861. 28 June 1911, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "The Class of '61." The Essential Holmes, edited by Richard A. Posner. University of Chicago Press, 1997.

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The truth is, that the law is always approaching, and never reaching, consistency. It is forever adopting new principles from life at one end, and it always retains old ones from history at the other, which have not yet been absorbed or sloughed off. It will become entirely consistent only when it ceases to grow.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Early Forms of Liability." 23 Nov. 1880, The Lowell Institute, Boston, MA, USA.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Early Forms of Liability." The Common Law. Belknap Press, 2009.

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It is revolting to have no better reason for a rule of law than that so it was laid down in the time of Henry IV. It is still more revolting if the grounds upon which it was laid down have vanished long since, and the rule simply persists from blind imitation of the past.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "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 Jan. 1897, Boston University School of Law, Boston, MA, USA.

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Current Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "The Path of the Law." The Essential Holmes: Selections from the Letters, Speeches, Judicial Opinions, and Other Writings of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr, edited by Richard A. Posner. University of Chicago Press, 1997.

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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.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Towne v. Eisner

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. United States, Supreme Court. Towne v. Eisner. United States Reports, vol. 245, 7 Jan. 1918, pp. 418-427. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/245/418/.

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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.

Adkins v. Children's Hospital

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. Dissenting Opinion. Adkins v. Children's Hospital. United States Reports, vol. 261, 9 Apr. 1923, pp. 567-571. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/250/616/.

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The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

The Common Law

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Original Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Lecture 1: Early Forms of Liability." Lowell Lectures. 23 Nov. 1880, Lowell Institute, Lowell, MA, USA.

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Current Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. The Common Law. Belknap Press, 2009, lecture 1.

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Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Read The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table at Project Gutenberg

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Sr. "The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table." The New England Magazine. Boston: Joseph T. Buckingham, Nov. 1831 and Feb. 1832.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell. The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table. Dover Publications, 2015.

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The only prize much cared for by the powerful is power. The prize of the general is not a bigger tent, but command.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Original Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Law and the Court." Dinner of the Harvard Law Association of New York. 15 Feb. 1913, New York, NY, USA.

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Current Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Law and the Court." The Essential Holmes: Selections from the Letters, Speeches, Judicial Opinions, and Other Writings of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr, edited by Richard A. Posner. University of Chicago Press, 1997.

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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.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

The Common Law

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Original Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. "Lecture 1: Early Forms of Liability." Lowell Lectures. 23 Nov. 1880, Lowell Institute, Lowell, MA, USA.

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Current Citation

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. The Common Law. Belknap Press, 2009, lecture 1.

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The government ought not to use evidence obtained and only obtainable, by a criminal act...for my part I think it a less evil that some criminals could escape than that, the Government should play an ignoble part.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Olmstead v. United States

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. United States, Supreme Court. Olmstead v. United States. United States Reports, vol. 277, 4 June 1928, pp. 438-485. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/277/438/.

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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. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Abrams v. United States

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. United States, Supreme Court. Abrams v. United States. United States Report, vol. 250, 10 Nov. 1919, pp. 616-631. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/250/616/.

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

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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General propositions do not decide concrete cases. The decision will depend on a judgement or intuition more subtle than any articulate major premise.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Lochner v. New York

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. Dissenting Opinion. Lochner v. New York. United States Reports, vol. 198, 17 Apr. 1905, pp. 74-76. Justia, https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/198/45/.

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The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic... 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.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Schenck v. United States

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr. United States, Supreme Court. Schenck v. United States. United States Reports, vol. 249, 3 Mar. 1919, pp. 47-53. Justia, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/249/47/.

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