Justice and The Law

I just watched a bit on O'Reilly with a family who lost a 6 year old to a drunk driver. The trial is ongoing, and will probably wrap up this week in New York. O'Reilly asked the dad what sort of punishment he wanted for the drunk driver.

The dad was pretty honest. He said he wanted him dead. I can't blame the guy.

Once upon a time, I became a lawyer. I took an oath. Part of that oath was to preserve the integrity of the system. Part of becoming a lawyer is to embrace the law. It's the last bastion before anarchy, etc.

But what's justice, really? Three different concepts of it leap into mind. There's justice, there's the law, and there's the right thing to do.

1. Pure justice would dictate the father of the 6-year old gets first crack at the drunk, and gets a chance to mete out revenge. That would balance the scales, one would think. We aren't going to get justice out of our current system. No way.

2. If he's left to the tender mercy of the system, the jury could walk him. Or they could find him guilty. He could face a maximum of 20 years. That's the worst. The average sentence is probably 12 or better. Is that an appropriate punishment? The guy will lose everything in prison. He'll have a felony record, which will probably prevent him from getting a decent job even if he survives prison. None of that is fun. Is that justice, though?

3. Let God deal with it in his own way. The drunk still has to face earthly punishment, of course. The interesting thing to me is that the drunk will have to account for what he's done in accordance with the system. But he'll get a free pass from God, if he accepts it. Kind of a hard concept to handle. I think most people would say that hell is probably too good for this child-killing drunk. But he's got the same shot at salvation as the Pope. There's an evil part in all of us that is almost offended that this murderer gets the same shot at redemption as the best of us. And he very well might refuse to follow that path, and he'll get the slow-roast for all eternity. Bottom line: it's not our call.

My faith in the legal system has taken some pretty hard knocks lately. I think the theory of the system is great. However, the people who get to run it have really messed it up.

What's "fair" for this drunk? Our Hammurabian concept of justice says he needs to die. Our legal system says he needs to get 20 years max. And our religion says this drunk will be welcome with open arms if he accepts God's mercy.

Man's basic eye-for-an-eye instinct? Our laws? Or God's laws? Pretty different concepts, with pretty dramatically different outcomes, in the end.

The first two are pretty fallible concepts. They can be changed in accordance with what Man thinks is right at any one time. Every two years we get bombarded with new laws that usually contradict the last batch we passed. Every so often, our societies change their entire outlooks on things. We don't pluck out eyes anymore, though part of me likes the concept.

The third relies on a higher power to arbitrate the whole mess. I'm seeing more and more how the laws of men fail us. I'm getting more and more inclined to allow the third option to have its way.

But that's pretty tough, isn't it??