Prohibition Quotes - Page 7

• If even a small fraction of the money we now spend on trying to enforce drug prohibition were devoted to treatment and drug rehabilitation, in an atmosphere of compassion not punishment, the reduction in drug usage and in the harm done to users could be dramatic.

  Milton Friedman

  Compassion, Punishment, Drug

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• The [Jewish] Sabbath was not intended to be simply a desert of prohibitions, but rather an oasis for moral restoration and seemly pleasure-one was to eat, drink, even be merry.

  Israel Shenker

  Oasis, Desert, Restoration

  Israel Shenker (1985). “Coat of Many Colors: Pages from Jewish Life”, Doubleday Books

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• Although our moral conscience is a part of our consciousness, we do not feel ourselves on an equality with it. In this voice which makes itself heard only to give us orders and establish prohibitions, we cannot recognize our own voices; the very tone in which it speaks to us warns us that it expresses something within us that is not of ourselves.

  Emile Durkheim

  Order, Voice, Giving

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• Sharia is the impetus behind multinational diplomatic efforts to accommodate Sharia blasphemy prohibitions on expression that offends Muslims.

  Frank Gaffney

  Expression, Effort, Blasphemy

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• One substitute for the disappearing Evil Empire (The Soviet Union) has been the threat of drug traffickers from Latin America. In early September 1989, a major government-media blitz was launched by the President. That month the AP wires carried more stories about drugs than about Latin America, Asia, the Middle East and Africa combined. If you looked at television, every news program had a big section on how drugs were destroying our society, becoming the greatest threat to our existence, etc.

  Noam Chomsky

  Latin, Media, Government

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• Five years of Prohibition have had, at least, this one benign effect: they have completely disposed of all the favorite arguments of the Prohibitionists. None of the great boons and usufructs that were to follow the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment has come to pass. There is not less drunkenness in the Republic, but more. There is not less crime, but more. There is not less insanity, but more. The cost of government is not smaller, but vastly greater. Respect for law has not increased, but diminished.

  H. L. Mencken

  Law, Government, Years

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• We have seen the evil of the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors in our midst; let us try prohibition and see what this will do for us

  Thomas Jordan Jarvis

  Evil, Trying, Liquor

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• Against self-slaughter There is a prohibition so divine That cravens my weak hand.

  William Shakespeare

  Suicide, Self, Hands

  1610 Innogen. Cymbeline, act 3, sc.4, l.76-8.

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• There'd never been a more advantageous time to be a criminal in America than during the 13 years of Prohibition. At a stroke, the American government closed down the fifth largest industry in the United States - alcohol production - and just handed it to criminals - a pretty remarkable thing to do.

  Bill Bryson

  Government, Years, America

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• We either believe in the dignity of the individual, the rule of law, and the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, or we don't. There is no middle ground.

  Leon Panetta

  Believe, Law, Punishment

  "Obama's CIA Pick Has Confirmation Hearings". Interview with Robert Siegel, www.npr.org. February 5, 2009.

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• One of the things is that the good intentions of Prohibition, from reading over the years and from becoming obsessed with the research of gangs in New York City, seems to have allowed crime figures at the time, like Luciano, Capone, Torrio and Rothstein, to organize to become more powerful, which pulled all the way through until the '70s.

  Martin Scorsese

  New York, Powerful, Reading

  "Martin Scorsese and Terence Winter Interview BOARDWALK EMPIRE". Interview with Christina Radish, collider.com. September 14, 2010.

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• A man who is without capital, and who, by prohibitions upon banking, is practically forbidden to hire any, is in a condition elevated but one degree above that of a chattel slave. He may live; but he can live only as the servant of others; compelled to perform such labor, and to perform it at such prices, as they may see fit to dictate.

  Lysander Spooner

  Men, Degrees, Banking

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• But…but you can’t treat religion as a sort of buffet, can you? I mean, you can’t say yes please, I’ll have some of the Celestial Paradise and a helping of the Divine Plan but go easy on the kneeling and none of the Prohibition of Images, they give me wind. Its table d´hôte or nothing, otherwise…well, it would be silly.

  Terry Pratchett

  Silly, Mean, Wind

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• The more prohibitions there are, the poorer the people will be. The more laws are promulgated, the more thieves and bandits there will be.

  Laozi

  Government, Law, People

  Laozi (1997). “Tao Te Ching”, p.17, Wordsworth Editions

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• The first precept in Buddhism is "Do not kill." This precept is not merely a legalistic prohibition, but a realization of our affinity with all who share the gift of life. A compassionate heart provides a firm ground for this precept.

  Dhammananda Bhikkhuni

  Buddhist, Heart, Buddhism

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• Faithful to the cause of Prohibition - She hath done what she could

  Carrie Nation

  Faith, Tombstone, Causes

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• When government accepts responsibility for people, then people no longer take responsibility for themselves.

  George Pataki

  Responsibility, Acceptance, Government

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• Christian socialism”). This is a difficult concept for modern liberals to grasp because they are used to thinking of the progressives as the people who cleaned up the food supply, pushed through the eight hour workday, and ended child labor. But liberals often forget that the progressives were imperialists, at home and abroad. They were the authors of Prohibition, the Palmer Raids, eugenics, loyalty oaths, and, in its modern incarnation, what many call “state capitalism.

  Jonah Goldberg

  Christian, Loyalty, Children

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• A 'well regulated militia' was thus one that was well-trained and equipped, not one that was 'well-regulated' in the modern sense of being subjected to numerous government prohibitions and restrictions.

  Glenn Reynolds

  Government, Modern, Restriction

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• Under the constitution, there was never meant to be a federal police force. Even an FBI limited only to investigations was not accepted until this century. Yet today, fueled by the federal government's misdirected war on drugs, radical environmentalism, and the aggressive behavior of the nanny state, we have witnessed the massive buildup of a virtual army of armed regulators prowling the States where they have no legal authority. The sacrifice of individual responsibility and the concept of local government by the majority of American citizens has permitted the army of bureaucrats to thrive.

  Ron Paul

  War, Responsibility, Army

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• The prohibition of science would be contrary to the Bible, which in hundreds of places teaches us how the greatness and the glory of God shine forth marvelously in all His works, and is to be read above all in the open book of the heavens.

  Galileo Galilei

  Book, Greatness, Shining

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• I don't feel any great need to subscribe to a certain notion of Buddhism that says "You have to do this" or "You have to do that." Buddhism does not prescribe rituals or prohibitions in the way many religions do.

  Pankaj Mishra

  Buddhism, Doe, Needs

  Interview with Sarah Fay, staging.believermag.com. March 2007.

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• Once we begin to appreciate that the apparent destructiveness of the toddler in taking apart a flower or knocking down sand castles is in fact a constructive effort to understand unity, we are able to revise our view of the situation, moving from reprimand and prohibition to the intelligent channeling of his efforts and the fostering of discovery.

  Polly Berrien Berends

  Moving, Flower, Intelligent

  Polly Berrien Berends (1987). “Whole child, whole parent”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• The period of Prohibition - called the noble experiment - brought on the greatest breakdown of law and order the United States has known until today. I think there is a lesson here. Do not regulate the private morals of people. Do not tell them what they can take or not take. Because if you do, they will become angry and antisocial and they will get what they want from criminals who are able to work in perfect freedom because they have paid off the police.

  Gore Vidal

  Thinking, Order, Law

  Gore Vidal (1978). “Matters of fact and of fiction: essays, 1973-1976”, Vintage

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• The drug war has nothing to do with making communities livable or creating a decent future for black kids. On the contrary, prohibition is directly responsible for the power of crack dealers to terrorize whole neighborhoods. And every cent spent on the cops, investigators, bureaucrats, courts, jails, weapons, and tests required to feed the drug-war machine is a cent not spent on reversing the social policies that have destroyed the cities, nourished racism, and laid the groundwork for crack culture.

  Ellen Willis

  War, Kids, Jail

  Ellen Willis (2012). “No More Nice Girls: Countercultural Essays”, p.250, U of Minnesota Press

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