[分享]一篇关于Unjust law的好文章

lisy

本月JJ题目，我在网上看到这篇好文章，供大家参考

"An unjust law is no law at all", said St Augustine, providing the foundation of civil disobedience movements across the globe. If a law is not really a law at all, it is argued, one has a right -- even a duty -- to break it. Martin Luther King articulated this view in his Letter from Birmingham Jail: "one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws".

The problem is that while the law is a matter of public record, justice is an intensely personal matter. What one person regards as just may strike another as an unwarranted imposition. This is why we need law; if we all behaved according to our personal standards of morality, anarchy would rule. While we may have our own views about the justice of particular laws, we generally accept that some rules must apply universally. If we are to follow Martin Luther King's exhortation to resist unjust laws, then, there must be an unusual type or degree of injustice to justify that. What kind of injustice might do so?

The great American democrat Henry David Thoreau had an answer. In his classic essay Civil Disobedience, Thoreau observed that "a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice". An infantile deference to the will of the majority, however ill-informed, is still common today. It informs the thoughtless "majority rules!" which is frequently blurted out as if, on its own, it magically justifies anything (I always want to ask whether, if the majority jumped off a cliff, the speaker would too). In fact, "majority rules" is a solution of last resort. Ideally, people should act according to their consciences. If that is inappropriate, unanimity should be sought. Only if these two fail should the will of the majority be imposed on the rest. Thoreau called for this kind of government, "in which the majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience... in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable".

Thoreau has identified the second, too often ignored element of democracy: that the majority should only dictate to the minority where a common rule is required. This is so in, for example, the tax system, which pools common resources; or in, say, road-building, where we cannot all practically build roads where we personally find them convenient. It also applies to the criminal law and the law of negligence, which protect us from harm inflicted by people whose consciences alone do not restrain them from harming others. But where our acts do not harm others, and no common purpose exists, Government should leave decisions to our consciences. The alternative is not democracy, but the tyranny of the majority. By this standard the Hunting Bill is profoundly unjust; expediency requires no common standard, and nor are others harmed.

Inconsistency is another marker of injustice. The Hunting Bill is, supposedly, intended to stop cruelty to animals. But even if you accept this proposition, the Bill is not consistent. It outlaws the hunting of wild mammals with dogs, while permitting the hunting of wild mammals with birds of prey, and of rodents with cats, and fishing, and shooting. If animal cruelty were the real target, then rather than banning hunting we should perhaps be opposing the EU's current chemicals regulation plans, which will cause a massive and unnecessary increase in animal testing. But no reasons for the selective and capricious singling-out of fox-hunting, stag-hunting and hare coursing have been offered. Half-truths and smokescreens are the currency of this government, but when they are used to justify such a huge imposition on people's consciences, the result can only be unjust.

What is the appropriate response to an unjust law, then? King argued that we should break it openly: "An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law". Thoreau agreed: "Under a government which imprisons unjustly, the true place for a just man is... a prison". All over the country in February, hunts will meet in defiance of an unjust law. Huntsmen imprisoned for following their consciences will not be criminals. They will be upholders of a noble tradition of resistance to injustice.