"People are getting smarter nowadays; they are letting lawyers, instead of their conscience, be their guide"
About this Quote
Rogers twists the word "smarter" into a sucker punch: what passes for modern intelligence is really just outsourced morality. The line works because it flatters the listener for half a second, then exposes the bargain underneath. In Rogers's world, "getting smarter" doesn't mean thinking more clearly; it means learning how to stay safe, stay plausible, stay unaccountable. Lawyers become the new conscience not because people have stopped believing in right and wrong, but because they've learned the reputational and legal cost of acting on it.
The joke lands on a cultural pivot point. In the early 20th century, America is professionalizing everything: business, politics, journalism, even virtue. As corporations grow and government expands, rules multiply, and so do the experts paid to navigate them. Rogers, a populist entertainer with a front-porch style, diagnoses a legalistic society where the question shifts from "Is this decent?" to "Can we get away with it?" That swap is the real target.
Subtextually, he is also needling the respectable classes who treat legality as a moral alibi. The lawyer isn't villainized as much as deputized: the public hires someone to translate ethics into technicalities, then calls the result "progress". Rogers's satire is gentle in delivery, brutal in implication. He's warning that when conscience gets replaced by counsel, responsibility doesn't disappear; it just gets billed by the hour.
The joke lands on a cultural pivot point. In the early 20th century, America is professionalizing everything: business, politics, journalism, even virtue. As corporations grow and government expands, rules multiply, and so do the experts paid to navigate them. Rogers, a populist entertainer with a front-porch style, diagnoses a legalistic society where the question shifts from "Is this decent?" to "Can we get away with it?" That swap is the real target.
Subtextually, he is also needling the respectable classes who treat legality as a moral alibi. The lawyer isn't villainized as much as deputized: the public hires someone to translate ethics into technicalities, then calls the result "progress". Rogers's satire is gentle in delivery, brutal in implication. He's warning that when conscience gets replaced by counsel, responsibility doesn't disappear; it just gets billed by the hour.
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| Topic | Witty One-Liners |
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