What is the correlation between law and
justice? I suspect that depends on the particular
law being considered. Law results from
the wishes of the political party in power when the law is made. An example of this would be The US Senate
deciding not to hear from witnesses or read documents when acting as jurors in
an impeachment trial. This would be “Blind
Justice” taken to an extreme. Justice is
probably a point of view of an individual or a like-minded group. In its purest form it would be decided by listening
to one’s own internal moral rudder.
Lower sources of justice would be: religion, political party, parents,
local law, friends or TV news casters.
Here are some of the examples that cause me to ask the question.
When I was in college, I served tables at a
fraternity house. One of the young men I
served was a hero to his brothers partly because he would often get very drunk
then get into his Corvette and knock over trash cans or other inanimate objects. It was laughed about and encouraged by the
group. On one unfortunate weekend the
objects were two young college women and they were killed. His brothers no longer knew him or encouraged
his frequent drunk driving. The law
suddenly got very serious and imprisoned him for much of the balance of his
natural life. That’s the law! Is it justice? I realize that each time the young man chose
to drive drunk, he chose to do something very wrong. However, he no more intended to kill the young
women than he intended to knock over the trash cans. Would you cage him for life because he killed
the young women or because he chose to drunken drive? Would you cage any of his fraternity brothers
for egging him on? Try to access your
moral rudder for the answers to these questions.
Imagine in a moment of temporary rage I
picked up a handgun and fired it at another human being; let’s look at law and
justice. If I hit the other person right
between the eyes and ended their life, I would be imprisoned for a long
time. If I missed and smashed up a lamp,
it would be a different issue. If it was
a first offence, for the miss, I would probably get my hand slapped by the law
and have to replace the lamp. The
difference here is not my intent or my actions.
It is my skill with the weapon that would determine my punishment. Is that moral justice or is it “the law”?
Assuming that I am a violent person (I’m not. I’m a pacifist.) and I’m at a bar and get into an argument, then throw a punch landing on my advisory’s jaw, the man could perhaps become unconscious for a moment or two, or could strike his head on a table corner and die. What now? Same punch, same intent. We are talking about the luck of the fall that determines the rest of my life. Is that justice? Our law is often based on random outcome not intent or action taken.
A young single mom is driving at 10 over the
speed limit in Seattle. She gets a
citation for $235. Bill Gates gets the
same ticket an hour later on the same street.
His ticket is also $235. For the
young woman the fine is two weeks of groceries for her and her child. For Bill, it is hardly an inconvenience. His secretary would probably write the check
and mail it. Is that equal punishment
under the law? I don’t suspect even Mr.
Gates would say it was. So wouldn’t you
say that in a just society annual income would be a factor in determining the
amount of a fine? Bill would be getting
multi-million dollar traffic fines (and I am OK with that).
I had the opportunity to pose these questions
to a retired federal judge. I was
interested in her perceived correlation between law and justice. Her final, irritated, answer to these
questions was, “Well, it’s the law!!”
It would be very difficult in some cases to
administer justice based on intent, not outcome, but it would be nice to try.
Cheers, Old
Buz 10/11/20
Iambloggerbuz.blogspot.com
