Justice (law)

“ How striking and instructive to observe the abstract rules of justice brought to bear, with equal readiness and precision, upon ordinary and extraordinary combinations of circumstances!—to witness the dead letter of the law become animated with potent vitality for the regulation of human affairs! ”

“ Mankind reaches out after the absolute right, makes its constitutions to establish justice, and provide for the common defence. We report the decisions of wise men, and of courts ; we keep the record of cases decided, to. help us judge more wisely in time to come. The nation would enact laws : it aims to get the justest men in the State, that they may incorporate their aggregate sense of right into a statute. We set twelve honest men to try an alleged offender; they are to apply their joint justice to the special case. The people wish law to be embodied justice, administered without-passion. ”

“ For more than six hundred years—that is, since Magna Carta, in 1215—there has been no clearer principle of English or American constitutional law, than that, in criminal cases, it is not only the right and duty of juries to judge what are the facts, what is the law, and what was the moral intent of the accused; but that it is also their right, and their primary and paramount duty, to judge of the justice of the law, and to hold all laws invalid, that are, in their opinion, unjust or oppressive, and all persons guiltless in violating, or resisting the execution of, such laws. ”

“ I believe in law and order; but I believe, as a condition precedent, that law and order should be predicated upon right and justice, pure and simple. Law is, intrinsically, a written expression of justice; if, on the contrary, it becomes instead written injustice, men are not, strictly speaking, bound to yield it obedience. ”

“ If such authority exists, then, in consequence of their establishment, to compel obedience to law, and to enforce justice, courts possess the right to inflict the very wrongs which they were created to prevent. ”

“ And even with help—it is a plague and a mystery till the true meaning has been settled—settled!—by adjudication: that is, by others in authority, the priesthood and the patriarchs, who, under the name of judges, are paid for all the thinking, as lawyers are paid for all the talking to no purpose, permitted at law: for, be it known to all whom it may concern, that is, to all the non-lawyers of our land, that no private interpretation of law is of any authority at law: nor is the right of private judgment recognized or allowed or tolerated or endured in courts of justice! ”

“ Our lawyers to-day are so far from believing that the balance of Justice should, in private law as well as in criminal law, weigh the injustice which has been done, and not only the pecuniary interest, that, in daring to speak about it, I must expect to hear it objected that in this precisely lies the difference between criminal law and the law pertaining to the rights of persons. ”

“ But, perhaps, if there was less Law, there might be more Justice, than in some other Courts; for, if the civil Law be a Law of universal Reason, judging of the Rectitude, or Obliquity of Mens Actions, every Man of common Sense is endued with a Portion of it, at least sufficient to make him distinguish Right from Wrong, or what the Civilians call, Malum in se. ”

“ If the application of a law would work injustice, no judge can in conscience pronounce sentence according to that law; but there are many cases recognized in jurisprudence in which courts of equity afford relief to rights that cannot be defended or protected in courts of law, and in cases of this kind the judge should be guided by recognized principles of natural justice and the rules of his court. ”

“ Among these he mentions a law which punishes a citizen for an innocent action; a law that destroys or impairs the lawful private contracts of citizens; a law that makes a man a judge in his own cause; and a law that takes the property from A. and gives it to B. 'It is against all reason and right,' says the learned justice, 'for a people to intrust a legislature with such powers ”

“ It is a rule founded upon the first principles of natural justice, older than written constitutions, that a citizen shall not be deprived of his life, liberty, or property, without an opportunity to be heard in defense of his rights, and the constitutional provision that no person shall be deprived of these 'without due process of law' has its foundation in this rule. ”

“ In the nature of things, if justice is to be done, the People should be entitled to the same rights as the individual. If we [Pg 169] are to have respect for law, the law must be deserving of respect, and law which makes rather for the acquittal than for the conviction of the guilty is not of that sort. ”

“ A theory which regards the law as the command of the state and nothing more, and which entirely ignores the aspect of law as a public declaration of the principles of justice, would lose all its plausibility, if expressed in a language in which the term for law signifies justice also. ”

“ These are metaphors that still commend themselves; for the honest man is still the straight and upright man, and the ways of wickedness are still crooked. In this sense, therefore, recht, droit, and diritto signify justice and right.
3. The first application being physical and the second ethical, the third is juridical. The transition from the second to the third is easy. Law is justice as recognised and protected by the state. The rules of law are the rules of right, as authoritatively established and enforced by tribunals appointed to that end. ”

“ There is little risk of overestimating the value of a life devoted to mastering that complex system of jurisprudence, the old, ever-expanding, and ever-improving common law which is interwoven with our whole fabric of government, property, and personal rights, and to applying it profoundly through trial by jury and before courts of law, not merely that justice may be obtained for clients, but that decisions shall be made determining the rights and duties of men for generations to come. ”

“ Both equal protection and due process emphasize the central aim of our entire judicial system-all people charged with crime must, so far as the law is concerned, 'stand on an equality before the bar of justice in every American court.' Chambers v. ”

“ These are the general characteristics of that incomparable monument of jurisprudence whose noble conceptions of the ends of legislation are best expressed in its own concise and energetic language:
“The law is the rival of divinity, the messenger of justice, and the guide of life. It dominates all classes of the state, and all ages of humanity, male and female, the young and the old, the wise and the ignorant, the noble and the peasant. It is not designed for the promotion of private aims, but to shelter and [189] protect the general interests of all. ”

“ Now and then an extraordinary case may turn up, but constitutional law, like other mortal contrivances, has to take some chances, and in the great majority of instances, no doubt, justice will be done. ”

“ Within the community the law insists that all force shall be judicial if possible. This protection against extrajudicial force—this freedom from all constraint save that which operates through the courts of law and justice—is one of the chief privileges of the members of the body politic. ”

“ Our constitutional law depends for its force, therefore, upon the fact that it approves itself to the good sense of the people; and the power of the courts is held upon condition that the precedents established by them are wise, statesmanlike, and founded upon enduring principles of justice which are worthy of the respect of the community. ”

“ The obligation should, nevertheless, be pointed out.
3. Impartiality and integrity concern above all civil justice. The duty which more especially concerns criminal justice, is equity; namely, a moderate justice, intermediary between a dangerous lenity and an excessive severity. In truth, in most cases, at least in the graver cases, the judge has scarcely anything more to do than to apply the law. It is for the jury, a sort of free and irresponsible magistracy, to decide upon the culpability or innocence of the prisoners. It is for the jury to find a just medium between harshness and lenity. ”

“ In short, if the jury have no right to judge of the justice of a law of the government, they plainly can do nothing to protect the people against the oppressions of the government; for there are no oppressions which the government may not authorize by law. ”

“ and these laws, which are made by them for their own interests, are the justice which they deliver to their subjects, and him who transgresses them they punish as a breaker of the law, and unjust. ”

“ The very idea of law originates in men's natural rights. There is no other standard, than natural rights, by which civil law can be measured. Law has always been the name of that rule or principle of justice, which protects those rights. Thus we speak of natural law. ”

“ The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.
2. A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and245 be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime. ”

“ The common sense of mankind is authority good enough to answer such a question; but we have high legal authority in addition.
In Baker VS. Riddle, Mr. Justice Baldwin, one of [Pg 303] the judges of the supreme court of the United States, held that it was not in the power of Congress to take away the right of trial by jury, secured by the seventh amendment, either,—“1. By an organization of the courts in such a manner as not to secure it to suitors;” or,—“2. By authorizing the courts to exercise, or their assumption of, equity or admiralty jurisdiction over cases at law.” ”

“ Justice is immortal, eternal, and immutable, like God himself; and the development of law is only then a progress, when it is directed towards those principles which, like Him, are eternal; and whenever prejudice or error succeeds in establishing in customary law any doctrine contrary to eternal justice, it is one of your noblest duties, gentlemen,—having no written Code to fetter justice within the bonds of error and prejudice,—it is one of your noblest duties to apply Principles, —to show that an unjust custom is a corrupt practice, an abuse; ”

“ But for their right to judge of the law, and the justice of the law, juries would be no protection to an accused person, even as to matters of fact; for, if the government can dictate to a jury any law whatever, in a criminal case, it can certainly dictate to them the laws of evidence. ”

“ Surely it may be assumed as a postulate, that a court of justice, in adjudicating upon the rights of the citizen or of the State, should do, and can have power to do, nothing which is irregular, or vain, or useless. ”

“ The adjudication of the conflicting interests of mankind, the interpretation of our statutes and [487] our common law the determination of rights and privileges of all men, is a judicial function. What rights we enjoy to-day have come in the final analysis from the courts. What rights we find ourselves to-day deprived of, and which we hope to enjoy to-morrow, must come, if at all, from the same source. The courts have the last word, and it is to that instrument of government we must appeal, and to that last word we must look for our safety, or fear our doom. ”

“ So, too, every man has, by nature, a right to judge of, and enforce, the rights, [104] and judge of, and redress the wrongs, of any and all other men. This right is included in his natural right to maintain justice between man and man, and to protect the injured party against the wrongdoer. ”

“ In proceeding to the establishment of laws, you wish to adopt them from ours, and such only for the present as suit your present condition; chiefly, indeed, those for the punishment of crimes, and the protection of property. But who is to determine which of our laws suit your condition, and shall be in force with you? All of you being equally free, no one has a right to say what shall be law for the others. ”

“ I am not the law, but I represent justice so far as my feeble powers go. ”

“ Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress. ”

“ But if we take the view of our friend the bad man we shall find that he does not care two straws for the axioms or deductions, but that he does want to know what the Massachusetts or English courts are likely to do in fact. I am much of his mind. The prophecies of what the courts will do in fact, and nothing more pretentious, are what I mean by the law.
Take again a notion which as popularly understood is the widest conception which the law contains;—the notion of legal duty, to which already I have referred. We fill the word with all the content which we draw from morals. ”

“ If you charge someone with having done you a wrong, it is not enough to prove your charge; you must also convince the court that common law, or statutory law, or equity gives you the right to redress. The first question in most important cases, both criminal and civil, is decided by a jury ”