The figure of Justitia (Latin for justice) has embodied justice in art since ancient times; and so it does here. She is depicted with scales and a sword. The scales represent careful weighing, the sword the consistent enforcement of the law. The four reliefs under the sculpture show the embodiments of the cardinal virtues: charity, hope, moderation and justice (Latin: Caritas, Spes, Temperantia and Justitia).
Justitia was created in 1887 by the Frankfurt artist Friedrich Schierholz (1840–1894), and was donated by the local wine merchant Gustav D. Manskopf. The first Frankfurt fountain stood on the same spot from 1543 and a stone Justitia fountain from 1611. In 1945, the Americans symbolically placed Justitia in their headquarters for two years.
The inscription above the reliefs reads:
Justitia in toto virtutum maxima mundo Sponte sua tribuit cuilibet aequa suum.
Justitia, first and greatest in the world of virtues, distributes to each his due with a just hand.