Law & Order Season 1 quotes

Don't make me testify. It'll ruin my career. I'm perfect for young dad parts in commercials.

Elizabeth Hendrick

Art would be much more pleasant if we didn't have to deal with artists.

Elizabeth Hendrick

It's my hope chest.

What were you hoping for?

Henry Rothman killed himself an hour ago. Couldn't face the thought of prison, I guess.

Elizabeth Hendrick

Did anyone take a picture?

Max

Take me off this one.

Max, you know I can't...

Max

I'm burned out. This thing disgusts me. This guy's pictures? Porn. If that's art, Hugh Hefner's Michelangelo.

Max, a man is dead here. You're the one saying it's not a suicide.

Max

What do you want me to do, lie? There was someone else there. Chances are, living that life, he'll be dead in a couple of years anyway. As far as I'm concerned, he's going to the same place.

What-what are you talking about?

Max

I'm a Catholic. Call me old-fashioned, but I still believe in sin. Remember sin? Right and wrong? I don't know if it's harps or pearly gates, but whatever it is, these freaks are not going to the same place you and I are, okay?

Wow! I can see this leading to a whole new penological outlook -- we will only pursue homicides where the vic died in a state of grace!

Robinette

You think I sold out?

Does it matter what I think? If it does I'll tell you, but it's something you got to decide for yourself.

Robinette

You got a ‘shave yourself in the morning' speech?

Maybe. Do you think of yourself as a black lawyer, or a lawyer who's black?

Robinette

Depends on the context.

You make a decision based on something from within. You live with it, you examine it, it's all you got.

Robinette

You think by morning I'll come to love it?

No, but I don't think you'll have any problem with the guy in the mirror. See you tomorrow.

You look me in the eye and you tell me this system is just. This system is equal.

Robinette

At times the system stinks, Eaton. I know that as well as you do. But don't for one damn minute tell me that your self-aggrandizing polarization is going to solve the problem. Don't tell me that tearing down a 200-year old justice system, no matter how flawed, is going to alter the consciousness of a society. Now, we're past the separate drinking-fountain stage. We're past legal discrimination. We're at the hearts and minds stage. And believe me, there's no quick fix.

Another zombified soul casts his vote for order rather than justice. Negative peace over positive peace.

Robinette

Paraphrasing Martin Luther King's thoughts won't lend credence to yours. King walked with the angels...you'd slide in slime on your belly to get what you want.

Max Greevey

Seventeen-year-olds shouldn't be doing the thing that makes babies.

Logan

And crooks shouldn't have guns. Get real.

Objection, this case is being judged on the temporal plane, your honor.

 :[talking about the effect of his sister's death. He seems almost numb.] This morning, my father made himself a cup of coffee. Put in milk, sugar...then he went over to the sink and poured it down the drain. He didn't know what he was doing. I was taking the highway to work, and I forgot to get off. I got to 95th street before I realized. I used to have a sister, and suddenly...I don't.

D.A. Adam Schiff

Amazing. Getting angry. The most emotional issue that the law has dealt with since suffrage. Look at us: three men. Talking about what rights women should have over their own bodies. Now doesn't that strike you as a little one-sided?

Our daughter acted according to her own conscience. We can live with that-

[interrupts him, distraught] YOU can live with that! A martyr will never be able to tell me what a wonderful day she had at school. A martyr will never have a wedding. A martyr will never have children!

If you're gonna stick your finger in my eye, Mr. Ballard, clean your own nails first.

If abortion is murder, then no matter how you feel about Mary Donovan, aren't you guilty of the murder of her unborn child?