"Discretionary" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... great honour, meaning, and import, and of which the generality of idle quidnuncs and coffee-house politicians can hardly form any but a very mean and contemptible idea. However, having had the command of a body of hussars, I went upon several expeditions, with discretionary powers; and the success I then met with is, I think, fairly and only to be placed to my account, and to that of the brave fellows whom I led on to conquest and to victory. We had very hot work once in the van of the army, when we drove the Turks into Oczakow. My spirited Lithuanian had almost ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... offer was made for all the dresses. The figure named was less than the aggregate estimate placed on them. Mr. Brady, however, having no discretionary power, he declined to close the bargain, but notified Mrs. Lincoln by mail. Of course, as yet, no reply has been received. Mrs. L. desires that the auction should be deferred till the 31st of the present month, ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley
... the mismanagement of the Post-Office Department, ascribed much of the rascality to "the large disbursements of money under the name of extra allowances. It is a puzzling problem to decide whether this discretionary power, throughout its whole existence, has done most mischief in the character of impostor upon the Department, or seducer to contractors. It has, doubtless, been an ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... that my Mother, the most mercenary of all Women, is gained by this false Friend of my Husband to sollicit me for him. I am frequently chid by the poor believing Man my Husband, for shewing an Impatience of his Friend's Company; and I am never alone with my Mother, but she tells me Stories of the discretionary Part of the World, and such a one, and such a one who are guilty of as much as she advises me to. She laughs at my Astonishment; and seems to hint to me, that as virtuous as she has always appeared, I am not the Daughter of her Husband. It is possible that printing this Letter may relieve ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... be more exact nor any prediction more accurately based. Henceforth, and by virtue of the Convention's own decrees, not only have the Jacobins the whole of the executive power in their hands, as this is found in civilized countries, but likewise the discretionary power of the antique tyrant or modern pasha, that arbitrary, strong arm which, singling out the individual, falls upon him and takes from him his arms, his freedom, and his money. After the 28th of March, we see in Paris a resumption of the system which, instituted by the 10th ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... for two years preceding the election, and could read, or understand and interpret when read to them, any section of the constitution of the State. Under this clause, between the cumulative tax and the large discretionary powers vested in the officers of enrollment, the negro electorate was reduced until it was negligible in Mississippi; and it was a subject of admiration for other Southern States, which proceeded to ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson
... judge the magistrates when they come out of office, and decide concerning public affairs as well as private contracts: that the supreme power should be in the public assembly; and that no magistrate should be allowed any discretionary power but in a few instances, and of no consequence to public business. Of all magistrates a senate is best suited to a democracy, where the whole community is not paid for giving their attendance; for in that case it; loses its power; for then the people will bring ...
— Politics - A Treatise on Government • Aristotle
... instructions from Governor Patrick Henry. He was empowered to choose a deputy-commandant, and officers for the militia; but the judges and officers of the court were to be elected by the people themselves. He was given large discretionary power, Henry impressing upon him with especial earnestness the necessity to "cultivate and conciliate the French and Indians." [Footnote: See Col. John Todd's "Record Book," while County Lieutenant of Illinois. There is an MS. ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... of the Church Times regrets, first of all, the failure of the Convention to change the name of the Church. He goes on to express a disapproval, more or less qualified, of the discretionary power given to bishops to set forth forms of prayer for special occasions, and of the continued permission to use Selections of Psalms instead of the psalms for the day. It is not quite clear whether he approves the expansion ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... esprit de corps, which, if it exists at all, exists only in the obscure ranks of the permanent subordinates. Boards, therefore, are not a fit instrument for executive business, and are only admissible in it when, for other reasons, to give full discretionary power to a single minister ...
— Considerations on Representative Government • John Stuart Mill
... financial department. You were accustomed to working subject to the First Level Commercial Regulation Code. Now, any law binding upon our people at home, on the First Level, is inflexible. It has to be. We found out, over fifty centuries ago, that laws have to be rigid and without discretionary powers in administration in order that people may be able to predict their effect and plan their activities accordingly. Naturally, you became conditioned to operating in such a climate ...
— Temple Trouble • Henry Beam Piper
... the chief object of his campaign should have been his junction with Burgoyne. The government, that is Germain, certainly erred in not giving him precise orders, while Burgoyne had virtually no discretionary power. Yet it was for Howe, as commander-in-chief on the spot, to judge of the situation without explicit instructions. According to his own statements, his view of the situation was that Burgoyne would march through a friendly ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... injure property, but prevent improvement. Partial objections of this nature, which after all may be very slight things, often prevent most useful measures from being carried. But why should there not be a discretionary power vested somewhere to relax any provision which, in particular cases, might be found harsh or inapplicable? This power might be given to a central office, or to local boards of health. Any suggestion of this kind is liable to objections; and the truth is, that ...
— The Claims of Labour - an essay on the duties of the employers to the employed • Arthur Helps
... licenses to penalties; but in May last the supreme court of the District held against this view of the powers of the Commissioners. It is of urgent importance, therefore, that Congress should supply, either by direct enactment or by conferring discretionary powers upon the Commissioners, proper limitations and restraints upon the liquor traffic in the District. The District has suffered in its reputation by many crimes of violence, a large per cent of them resulting from drunkenness and the liquor traffic. The capital of the nation should ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison
... thus obtained and held, and lands appropriated by the Crown for certain general objects, which have been vested in the hands of no religious community, and over which Parliament has expressly reserved the power of discretionary legislation. ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... keeping it aglow,—if every one of them could be drowned to-night, by their best friends, instead of being put tenderly to bed. This heroic method of treating human maladies, moral and material, is certainly beyond the scope of man's discretionary rights, and probably will not be adopted by Divine Providence until the opportunity of milder reformation shall have been offered us, again and again, through a series ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... carries along with it no testimonial of good behaviour, and certifies nothing but that the person belongs to the parish to which he really does belong, it is altogether discretionary in the parish officers either to grant or to refuse it. A mandamus was once moved for, says Doctor Burn, to compel the church-wardens and overseers to sign a certificate; but the Court of King's Bench rejected the motion as a very ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... execution, a considerable reduction of improper expense; that it should effect a conversion of unprofitable titles into a productive estate; that it should lead to, and indeed almost compel, a provident administration of such sums of public money as must remain under discretionary trusts; that it should render the incurring debts on the civil establishment (which must ultimately affect national strength and national credit) so very difficult as to ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... was freely criticised for recognizing an unlimited discretionary right on the part of a captor to destroy a neutral prize. Under all the circumstances the main grievance against Germany was not that she destroyed prizes at sea, but that she utterly ignored the restrictions ...
— From Isolation to Leadership, Revised - A Review of American Foreign Policy • John Holladay Latane
... fund of virtue and principle to carry the laws into due and effectual execution. Wisdom might plan, but virtue alone could execute. And where could sufficient virtue be found? A variety of delegated, and often discretionary, powers must be entrusted somewhere; which, if not governed by integrity and conscience, would necessarily be abused, till at last the constable would ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... considerations of peace and justice to the impulse of any immediate interest or passion. If the particular States in this country are disposed to stand in a similar relation to each other, and to drop the project of a general DISCRETIONARY SUPERINTENDENCE, the scheme would indeed be pernicious, and would entail upon us all the mischiefs which have been enumerated under the first head; but it would have the merit of being, at least, consistent and practicable ...
— The Federalist Papers
... the charge of oppression, although supported by the cries of the people and the most authentic representations, it is yet impossible, in most cases, to obtain legal proofs of it; and unless the discretionary power which I have recommended be somewhere lodged, the assurance of impunity from any formal inquiry will baffle every order of the board; as, on the other hand, the fear of the consequences will restrain every man within the bounds of his duty, if he knows himself liable ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke
... sentinels stationed about the ship—ample to have nipped in the bud any attempt to seize the vessel, but for two serious errors of judgment on the part of the officer responsible for their disposition. These were, first, the discretionary power vested in the sentries at the scuttle; and, second, the inadequate guard, a solitary man, set for the defence of the great cabin and the arms it contained. Now let us see how these errors ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... National Guard's uniform. The poor fellow stepped out between the two lines of soldiers, and the door closed on him. He was taken before the colonel, who was instructed to examine the prisoners, and had the discretionary power of ordering them to be shot on the spot, or of sending them to Versailles to appear before the superior commission, by whom they were either set at liberty or sentenced to transportation. Poor Lefevre was not heard of again. We thought we heard a brisk ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... that Ieyasu, residing in the Fushimi palace, should act as regent until Hideyori reached the age of fifteen, and that Maeda Toshiiye, governing the castle of Osaka, should act as guardian of Hideyori. It is recorded by some historians that the taiko conferred on Ieyasu discretionary power in the matter of Hideyori's succession, authorizing the Tokugawa baron to be guided by his own estimate of Hideyori's character as to whether the latter might be safely trusted to discharge the high duties that would devolve on him when he reached his ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... "Is there no discretionary power left?" inquired the Captain. "It must be oppressive, if carried out; Good men-whether they be white or black-are entitled to the advantages due them; but where laws such as you describe are carried out, a good man's ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... discretionary system of law controlled by the amir, although civil codes are being implemented; Islamic law ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... quantity of ammunition stores for the service of the war, which would certainly have been seized or embezzled; so that no service could be more seasonable or useful in the present juncture than this, which the Queen highly approved, and left the Duke a discretionary power to act as he thought ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift
... fold, and beneath her own vigilant supervision. In Cambridge there is, so far, a laxer administration of this rule, that, when any college overflows, undergraduates are allowed to lodge at large in the town. But in Oxford this increase of peril and discretionary power is thrown by preference upon the senior graduates, who are seldom below the age of twenty-two or twenty-three; and the college accommodations are reserved, in almost their whole extent, for the most youthful part of the society. This extent is prodigious. ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... You cannot effect quicker cures by giving larger doses. Different medicines, different diets, different operations are required for each; and consideration, encouragement, nursing, personal effort are necessary for all. Great flexibility and variety of procedure, and a wide discretionary power, entrusted to earnest and competent people, must characterise any attempt to ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill
... Mr. Sabin continued, "the wrong word to use. We submit to your authority, but you and I are well aware that your discretionary powers are large. I ask ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the Hudson, and, now that the British army was free, more clearly than ever, that both forts ought to be abandoned. Sure of his ground, he overruled Congress, but was so far influenced by Greene that he gave to that officer discretionary orders as to withdrawal. This was an act of weakness, as he afterwards admitted, for which he bitterly reproached himself, never confusing or glossing over his own errors, but loyal there, as elsewhere, to facts. An attempt was made to ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... of the nobility may have been purely adventitious, the result of the lucky accident of command and conquest amidst a wealthy and pliant people. The spoils of war were, it is true, not for the general but for the State; yet he exercised great discretionary power in dealing with the movable objects, which in the case of Hellenic or Asiatic conquest formed one of the richest elements in the prize, and the average commander is not likely to have displayed the self-restraint and public spirit of the destroyer of Corinth. Public and military opinion would ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... Lady Vargrave in all matters connected with Evelyn's education and home. It may be as well, in this place, to add, that to Vargrave and the co-trustee, Mr. Gustavus Douce, a banker of repute and eminence, the testator left large discretionary powers as to the investment of the fortune. He had stated it as his wish that from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and thirty thousand pounds should be invested in the purchase of a landed estate; but he had left it to the discretion of the trustees to increase that sum, even to the ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... except a reasonable aid to ransom his person if he were taken in war, to make his eldest son a knight, and to marry his eldest daughter. What should, on these occasions, be deemed a reasonable aid, was not determined; and the demands of the crown were so far discretionary. [FN [a] LL. Will. ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... various directions to various towns. It assumed such proportions that it was very evident that the commissioners had not the funds to perform the operations required by the law. The law confines the commissioners to one operation,—killing and burying. No discretionary power is given at all. The commissioners became entirely dissatisfied with that condition of things, because other measures besides merely killing and burying, are quite as necessary and important. When they arrived ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... Meath, is to be seen growing, not corn for men, but grass for cattle. The success of the country in stock-raising may very easily be rendered nugatory if the exclusion of Argentine and Canadian cattle from the English market be ended by the passing of an Act giving the Board of Agriculture a discretionary power to maintain or remove the embargo on their importation, according as the danger of an introduction of cattle disease exists or disappears. The enormous import trade which is done in Danish butter, Italian cheese, and ...
— Ireland and the Home Rule Movement • Michael F. J. McDonnell
... Kirkbyres—not that she liked being alone, or indeed being there at all, for she would have lived on the Continent, but that her son's trustees, partly to indulge their own aversion to her, taking upon them a larger discretionary power than rightly belonged to them, kept her too straitened, which no doubt in the recoil had its share in poor Stephen's misery. It was only after scraping for a whole year that she could escape to Paris ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... compute how, in the intermediate years, the growths may be made, according to what is set down in the following table, wherein making the doubling to be ten years at first, and within 1,200 years at last, we take a discretionary liberty, but justifiable by observations and the Scriptures for the rest, which table we leave to be corrected by historians who know the bigness of ancient cities, armies, and colonies in the respective ...
— Essays on Mankind and Political Arithmetic • Sir William Petty
... of the council had given Washington a discretionary power in the present juncture to order out militia for the purpose of garrisoning the fort in the absence of the regular troops. Washington exercised the power with extreme reluctance. He considered it, he said, an affair of ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... succor of ships or men he might need, and an asylum in his dominions if he should be compelled to leave Rome. He did more; he relaxed the bonds of the press, improved the administration of justice, deprived the police of their discretionary power, enlarged and amended the Council of State, emancipated the communes, and allowed their officers to be chosen by popular vote. The character and example of Pius seemed likely to effect as great and as beneficial changes out of his dominions as within them. Those of the Italian sovereigns ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... compel Lacheneur to leave the country. This would be an easy matter for him, since he was armed with discretionary authority at an epoch when lukewarm devotion afforded an abundant excuse for sending a ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau
... Company's demand in England has rarely fallen short of two thousand tons, nor much exceeded two thousand five hundred. A discretionary allowance of this commodity has been made to the French, Dutch, and Danes, who purchase their allotted shares at some small advance on the Company's price. The supply destined for the London market is proportioned to the spare tonnage; and to accommodate ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... legislature, that is, by the Senate and House; that the House should vote for the appropriations agreeably to the laws already made. This view was sanctioned by practice. Mr. Gallatin immediately opposed this as an alarming and dangerous principle. He insisted that there was a certain discretionary power in the House to appropriate or not to appropriate for any object whatever, whether that object were authorized or not. It was a power vested in the House for the purpose of checking the other branches of government whenever necessary. He claimed that this power was ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... surprised, that I should have no discretionary authority on that subject, and observed, that he had supposed I was a Minister Plenipotentiary. I told him, that few Ministers Plenipotentiary had discretionary power to transfer and cede to others the countries of their sovereigns. He denied, that the countries in question were ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... were conversant with the precepts of philosophy. They frequently declined the odious task of persecution, dismissed the charge with contempt, or suggested to the accused Christian some legal evasion, by which he might elude the severity of the laws. [67] Whenever they were invested with a discretionary power, [68] they used it much less for the oppression, than for the relief and benefit of the afflicted church. They were far from condemning all the Christians who were accused before their tribunal, and very far from punishing with death all those who were convicted of an obstinate ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... occurrence of conferences for the consideration of important matters of common interest to civilized nations, I respectfully suggest that the Executive be invested by Congress with discretionary powers to send delegates to such conventions, and that provision be made to defray ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 8: Chester A. Arthur • James D. Richardson
... trial was entered upon, a singular difficulty presented itself. Not any of the witnesses of the events of the 10th of November, would make a deposition against Sam. The presiding judge threatened them with his discretionary power in vain. Sam then commanded them to give evidence. All their tongues were loosed. They related what ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... of the Monastic corporations which have always found unconditional support in the Spanish Government, overcame this sacred duty and the Philippines remained excluded from the Spanish Constitution, and the people at the mercy of the discretionary or arbitrary powers of ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... the Government was the formation of a Board of Grain Commissioners with wide discretionary powers. They would be made responsible for the proper conduct of the entire grain trade and deal with all matters pertaining thereto. They were to have the absolute say-so in regard to car distribution and there was one clause that threatened this protection for which the Western ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse
... more their sovereign than the king himself; and their own band was more connected with them than their country. Hence the perpetual turbulence, disorders, factions, and civil wars of those times: hence the small regard paid to a character, or the opinion of the public: hence the large discretionary prerogatives of the crown, and the danger which might have ensued from the too great limitation of them. If the king had possessed no arbitrary powers, while all the nobles assumed and exercised them, there must have ensued an absolute anarchy ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... irretrievably to ruin; when the earl complaining one day bitterly of this state of things, for which he knew no remedy, she told him that she would find the remedy, and undertake to recover what was lost and redeem what remained, if he would give her absolute discretionary power to deal with his property as she pleased, and not interfere with her management of it for a whole year. He agreed to this, but, not satisfied with his promise, she made him bind himself by oath and, moreover, execute documents, giving her legal power enabling her to act independently of ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... to our ally before he signed them:' this caution, however, arose from Jay's patriotic circumspection; he excused himself on the ground that his instructions 'had been given for the benefit of America, and not of France,' and argued justly that there was discretionary power to consult the public good rather than any literal directions, the spirit, aim, and scope thereof being steadily adhered to. Subsequent revelations abundantly proved that sagacity rather than suspicion, and knowledge more than conjecture justified ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... merely removed: it wished to destroy it at the root. It was not satisfied with the promise of the King that he would never in any case punish by arrest, unless he was convinced in his conscience of its necessity. They wished to put an end to this discretionary power itself, of which his ministers could avail themselves at pleasure. Parliament demanded that henceforth no one should be arrested without assignment of the reason and observance of the ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... urged upon the authorities the absolute necessity of accepting this promising student. The president himself was biased. He hinted that the function of examiners was not so much to make absolute measurement of scholastic attainments as to manifest a discretionary view of possibilities, and to remember that examination papers were often incapable of gauging the most important natural endowments of the candidate; that sometimes when it was necessary to put a blood horse over a five-barred gate, ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... York, in the extreme north of Australia, to the "south cape of Van Diemen's Land," then, of course, supposed to be part of the main continent. He was ordered to land at Botany Bay and there form the settlement, but was given a discretionary power to change the site, if he considered ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... deal of trouble, and probably bring in considerable aid. My husband and I have long been accustomed to preparing tracts and small periodicals for the press, so that I think we know exactly what ought to be made public and what not. If thou likest to give me this discretionary power, do so, and I will endeavor to exercise it wisely, and in a way that I feel almost certain would be in ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... not at present invariable. Within certain limits the law unwisely allows a discretionary power to the magistrates of the county where the jail is; and the jailer, or, as he is now called, the governor, is their agent ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... "I have large discretionary powers. We have a very strong branch over on this side, but I would very much rather induce you to stay ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... direct, but must first sentence the young person to imprisonment and then recommend transfer to an industrial school. Such a system is not only cumbersome, but is fundamentally wrong, and should be remedied as soon as possible. The Courts should have discretionary powers to commit any young offender under eighteen years of age direct ...
— Mental Defectives and Sexual Offenders • W. H. Triggs, Donald McGavin, Frederick Truby King, J. Sands Elliot, Ada G. Patterson, C.E. Matthews |
