Fairness

While you ask yourselves, 'what do they, the Indians, want?,' you have only to look at the unjust laws made for them, and say they want what I want, which is that 'all men must operate under one general law.'
~ William Apes, Eulogy on King Philip, as Pronounced at the Odeon in Federal Street, Boston (1836).

The use of a mentally ill person's involuntary confession is antithetical to the notion of fundamental fairness embodied in the Due Process Clause.
~ William Joseph Brennan, Jr. (dissenting opinion), Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157 (1986)

[W]e cannot . . . let color blindness become myopia which masks the reality that many "created equal" have been treated within our lifetimes as inferior both by the law and by their fellow citizens.
~ William Joseph Brennan, Jr., University Of California Regents v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978).

When a country of more than 200 million people inflicts an unusually severe punishment no more than 50 times a year, the inference is strong that the punishment is not being regularly and fairly applied.
~ William Joseph Brennan, Jr. (concurring opinion), Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 314 (1972).

When men and women become ashamed of doing nothing and strive to give to society full compensation for all they receive from society, there will be harmony between the classes.
~ William Jennings Bryan, in The Public (14 July 1906). The White Man's Burden (Address at the Independence Day Banquet of the American Society of London; 4 July 1906)

Be just and if you can't be just, be arbitrary.
~ William S. Burroughs, The Naked Lunch (1959).

If life was fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead.
~ "Johnny" William Carson, NBC TV. The Tonight Show

I defy you to agitate any fellow with a full stomach.
~ William Cobbett,

Just knows, and knows no more, her Bible true, --
~ William Cowper, from The Complete Poetical Works of William Cowper (1842). Truth (written in 1782)

A little less complaint and whining, and a little more dogged work and manly striving, would do us more credit than a thousand civil rights bills.
~ William Edward Burghardt (W.E.B.) Du Bois

I believe that all men, black and brown, and white, are brothers, varying, through time and opportunity, in form and gift and feature, but differing in no essential particular, and alike in soul and in the possibility of infinite development.
~ William Edward Burghardt (W.E.B.) Du Bois, from Darkwater: Voices from within the Veil (1920). Credo

Nature has never read the Declaration of Independence. It continues to make us unequal.
~ William James "Will" Durant

Thro' life's sad journey hopeless to complain,
Can sacred Justice these events ordain?
But, O my soul! avoid that wondrous maze
Where Reason, lost in endless error, strays!
~ William Falconer, The Shipwreck (1762). Canto III

In my time I have seen truth that was anything under the sun but just, and I have seen justice using tools and instruments I wouldn't want to touch with a 10-foot fence rail.
~ William Faulkner

Some things you must always be unable to bear. Some things you must never stop refusing to bear. Injustice and outrage and dishonor and shame. No matter how young you are or how old you have got. Not for kudos and not for cash. Your picture in the paper nor money in the bank, neither. Just refuse to bear them.
~ William Faulkner

To live anywhere in the world today and be against equality because of race or color is like living in Alaska and being against snow.
~ William Faulkner, Essays, Speeches and Public Letters

All is fair in love, war, and poker.
~ William J. Florence (nee William Jermyn Conlin), The Gentleman's Handbook on Poker (1892).

Justice delayed is justice denied.
~ William Ewart Gladstone, Attributed

To be engaged in opposing wrong affords, under the conditions of our mental constitution, but a slender guarantee for being right.
~ William Ewart Gladstone, Time and Place of Homer (introduction)

If justice have any meaning, it is just that I should contribute every thing in my power to the benefit of the whole.
~ William Godwin, An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793).

Justice is the sum of all moral duty.
~ William Godwin, An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793).

Life isn't fair. It's just fairer than death, that's all.
~ William Goldman, The Princess Bride (1973).

Justice without spirit of justice is as much of an achievement as a river without its water.
~ William John (W.J.) Grant, The Spirit of India (1933).

I haven't been able to touch my family since the 16th of January. Soon, I hope, this will be over, and we'll be able to carry on with our lives.
~ William Harris, The Sacramento Bee (23 February 2002). SLA's Harris is freed on bail

Envy among other ingredients has a mixture of justice in it. We are more angry at undeserved than at deserved good-fortune.
~ William Hazlitt

Those are ever the most ready to do justice to others, who feel that the world has done them justice.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

In general, the world is a rational place in which winners on the whole deserve to win and losers deserve to lose. It is only for the exception, the lives that are strikingly unfair, that we maintain the mediating devices of social welfare.
~ William A. Henry III, In Defense of Elitism (1994).

Justice! a word supremely good,
Which may be eas'ly understood;
It means no more, say all we can,
Than what is right 'twixt man and man.
~ William Hutton, from Poems, chiefly tales (1804). Justice

We are always sowing our future; we are always reaping our past.
~ William Ralph (Dean) Inge, from Faith and Knowledge (1904).

Oh Justice, when expelled from other habitations, make this thy dwelling place.
~ William Jewell (inscription over the door of the Boone County Court House)

If I drop dead this second, our position will not change on this issue. It's not my issue alone.
~ William Woodward "Hootie" Johnson (remarks on the single-gender membership policy at Augusta National Golf Club, made during the annual state-of-the-Masters press conference), The Associated Press (9 April 2003). Club has no timetable: Augusta chairman 'comfortable' with present status

I've run into more discrimination as a woman than as an Indian.
~ Wilma Mankiller

There are many in this old world of ours who hold that things break about even for all of us. I have observed, for example, that we all get about the same amount of ice. The rich get it in the summertime and the poor get it in winter.
~ William Barclay "Bat" Masterson

The rain fell alike upon the just and upon the unjust, and for nothing was there a why and a wherefore.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage (1915).

Who has given to me this sweet,
And given my brother dust to eat?
And when will his wage come in?
~ William Vaughn Moody, Poems (1901). Gloucester Moors

For all these shall be ours and all men's; nor shall any lack a share
Of the toil and the gain of living in the days when the world grows fair.
~ William Morris, from Poems by the Way (1891). The Day is Coming

I do not want art for a few, any more than education for a few, or freedom for a few.
~ William Morris, Address delivered before the Trades' Guild of Learning, London (4 December 1877). The Decorative Arts, Their Relation To Modern Life And Progress

If it be an evil to judge rashly or untruly any single man, how much a greater sin it is to condemn a whole people.
~ William Penn, A Key Opening the Way (1693).

The Constitution requires that Congress treat similarly situated persons similarly, not that it engage in gestures of superficial equality.
~ William H. Rehnquist

People want just taxes more than they want lower taxes. They want to know that every man is paying his proportionate share according to his wealth.
~ Will Rogers

Be just, and fear not:
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,
Thy God's, and truth's.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry VIII. Act III, scene ii

Fair is foul, and foul is fair:
Hover through the fog and filthy air.
~ William Shakespeare, Macbeth. Act I, scene i

For, as thou urgest justice, be assured
Thou shalt have justice, more than thou desir'st.
~ William Shakespeare

I not deny
The jury, passing on the prisoner's life,
May in the sworn twelve have a thief or two
Guiltier than him they try.
~ William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure. Act II, scene i

I like not fair terms and a villain's mind.
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act I, scene iii

In time the savage bull doth bear the yoke.
~ William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing

Let's go hand in hand, not one before another.
~ William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors. Act V, scene i

Like a fair house, built on another man's ground.
~ William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor

See how yond justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark, in thine ear: change places; and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief?
~ William Shakespeare, King Lear

The hand that hath made you fair hath made you good.
~ William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure

Use every man after his desert, and who should scape whipping?
~ William Shakespeare, Hamlet

What judgement shall I dread, doing no wrong?
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act IV, scene i

The vestiges of racism and discrimination have been removed from the law; now it is time to remove them from the board rooms of corporate America
~ William-Paul Thomas, The Associated Press (2 February 2002). Group targets race-based insurance premiums

The greatest safety will be found in open and universall justice, who relyeth on any other will be deceived.
~ William Walwyn, England's Lamentable Slavery (October 1645).

In the face of unjust criticism
we can become bitter or better;
upset or understanding;
hostile or humble;
furious or forgiving.
~ William Arthur Ward

I am looking for closure. I am not bitter. I am not angry. In fact, there's a great sense of peace that has come over me in the past year. I feel as though a great weight has been lifted.
~ Essie Mae Washington-Williams, Press conference at the Adam's Mark hotel, Columbia, SC (17 December 2003).

Let justice be done though the heavens fall.
~ William Watson, A Decacordon of Ten Quodliberticall Questions Concerning Religion and State (1602).

Let it to a girl to take the fun out of sex discrimination.
~ Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

I know the world isn't fair, but why isn't it ever unfair in my favor?
~ Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

Peace without justice is tyranny.
~ William Allen White

Whoever tramples on the plea for justice temperately made in the name of peace only outrages peace and kills something fine in the heart of man which God put there when we got our manhood.
~ William Allen White, in The Emporia Gazette (26 July 1922).

All life is equal in the eternal eye.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox, from Poems of Power (1901). Mission

The constitution does not provide for first and second class citizens.
~ Wendell Lewis Wilkie, An American Programme (1944)

I play basketball more than anything else. It's fun. Almost my whole class is on the basketball team. My little friends said, "That's not fair that you can't play."
~ Colm Williams, in Boston Globe Hoop dreams: 6-year-old in wheelchair wants to play with the able-bodied (15 March 2002)

Judge not, lest you be so fearful of judgment that you can hardly breath.
~ Paul Williams

It would be ridiculous for me to say anything negative regarding blacks having an equal opportunity on TV. After all, I was number one in the ratings four times last year and twice this season. What could be more damn equal than that? If they get any more equal, I don't want it.
~ Clerow "Flip" Wilson (1971), Quoted in The Associated Press (26 November 1998). Comedian Flip Wilson Dies at 64

Everybody should have an equal chance -- but they shouldn't have a flying start.
~ Harold Wilson, The Observer (1963). Sayings of the Year