A sociosphere of contact, control, persuasion and dissuasion, of exhibitions of inhibitions in massive or homeopathic doses...: th...is is obscenity. All structures turned inside out and exhibited, all operations rendered visible. In America this goes all the way from the bewildering network of aerial telephone and electric wires ... to the concrete multiplication of all the bodily functions in the home, the litany of ingredients on the tiniest can of food, the exhibition of income or IQ.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
An ... important antidote to American democracy is American gerontocracy. The positions of eminence and authority in Congress are ...allotted in accordance with length of service, regardless of quality. Superficial observers have long criticized the United States for making a fetish of youth. This is unfair. Uniquely among modern organs of public and private administration, its national legislature rewards senility.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The dignity and stability of government in all its branches, the morals of the people, and every blessing of society, depend so mu...ch upon an upright and skilful administration of justice, that the judicial power ought to be distinct from both the legislative and executive, and independent upon both, that so it may be a check upon both, as both should be checks upon that.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We have a responsibility to "make a difference" in the legal system and the administration of justice. My hope is that when histor...ians assess the impact of this early wave of successful women entering all corners of the legal profession, they will not find us wanting.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance..., can spare one or another of us.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Lined with lindens of medium size with hanging droplets of rain distributed among their intricate black twigs according to the fut...ure arrangement of leaves (tomorrow each drop would contain a green pupil); complete with a smooth tarred surface some thirty feet across and variegated sidewalks (hand-built, and flattering to the feet), it rose at a barely perceptible angle, beginning with a post office and ending with a church, like an epistolary novel.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In one instance, we understood that a woman was the post- mistress, and they said that she made the best one on the road; but we s...uspected that the letters must be subjected to a very close scrutiny there.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I observed that the vitals of the village were the grocery, the bar-room, the post-office, and the bank; and, as a necessary part ...of the machinery, they kept a bell, a big gun, and a fire-engine, at convenient places; and the houses were so arranged as to make the most of mankind, in lanes and fronting one another, so that every traveller had to run the gauntlet, and every man, woman, and child might get a lick at him.... For the most part I escaped wonderfully from these dangers, either by proceeding at once boldly and without deliberation to the goal, as is recommended to those who run the gauntlet, or by keeping my thoughts on high things, like Orpheus, who, "loudly singing the praises of the gods to his lyre, drowned the voices of the Sirens, and kept out of danger." Sometimes I bolted suddenly, and nobody could tell my whereabouts, for I did not stand much about gracefulness, and never hesitated at a gap in a fence. I was even accustomed to make an irruption into some houses, where I was well entertained, and after learning the kernels and the very last sieveful of news,--what had subsided, the prospects of war and peace, and whether the world was likely to hold together much longer,--I was let out through the rear avenues, and so escaped to the woods again.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other. We me...et at meals three times a day, and give each other a new taste of that old musty cheese that we are. We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable and that we need not come to open war. We meet at the post-office, and at the sociable, and about the fireside every night; we live thick and are in each other's way, and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus lose some respect for one another. Certainly less frequency would suffice for all important and hearty communications. Consider the girls in a factory,--never alone, hardly in their dreams. It would be better if there were but one inhabitant to a square mile, as where I live. The value of a man is not in his skin, that we should touch him.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »