“As a Senator I am opposed to duelling. As Ben. Wade, I recognize the code.”

I am not unconscious of the persuasive power exerted by these considerations to drag men along in the current; but I am not at liberty to travel that road.

I know how easy it is for some minds to glide along with the current of popular opinion, where influence, respectability, and all those motives which tend to seduce the human heart are brought to bear.

I am not unaware how unpopular on this floor are the sentiments I am about to advocate.

Sometimes it leads me even to hesitate whether I am strictly correct in my idea that all men are born to equal rights, for their conduct seems to me to contravene the doctrine.

I have always believed, heretofore, in the doctrines of the Declaration of Independence, that all men are born free and equal; but of late it appears that some men are born slaves, and I regret that they are not black, so all the world might know them.

The humiliation of the North is complete and overwhelming.

Sir, I am no sycophant or worshipper of power anywhere.

I may fall here in the Senate chamber, but I will. never make any compromise with any such men.

I am amazed at the facility with which some men follow in the wake of slavery.

You can hide all kinds of clever and dirty code behind a good interface if you really need such code.

Now that’s a law. Laws made by man are rules reflecting the current status of his moral codes. As he alters and whittles away his morality, casting bits and pieces aside, his codes change to reflect it.

MTV and the culture industry never are talking about community relevance, hood organization, they aren’t talking about ethical codes, they aren’t talking about forms of political organization, they don’t speak about codes inside the jails. What they talk about are superficial things.

The problem is that those few programmers who crank out code aren’t interested in maintaining it.

My first album was mainly dealing with street issues, and it was ‘coded’: it was called ‘Reasonable Doubt.’ So the things I was talking about…

There are more words in the IRS code than there are in the Bible. And not a one of them is as good.

When the accumulation of wealth is no longer of high social importance, there will be great changes in the code of morals.

Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.