Paradigm Reversal
We take it for granted that a compass needle will point to the North, but in fact the Earth’s magnetic field has reversed its polarity many times and some think we are due for a reversal any day now. The fundamental paradigms that underlie the structure of a culture are subject to change, of course. They can and do evolve over time to reflect the nature of the world and our place in it. Seldom, however, is a core value reversed– visibly, in a matter of a few decades…
In our nation’s history up through around 1960 or so (the famous Miranda decision was in 1966), our culture thoroughly embraced the following principle, which would be familiar to anyone who grew up in middle of the 20th century:
It is better to let ten guilty people go free than to punish one innocent person.
This simple principle is central to our system of government, and most particularly to our system of law. It is also central to Christianity, which is supposed to be the majority religion in this country. It is at the heart of our “innocent until proven guilty” rule.
But times have changed. The current prevailing philosphy is:
It is better to punish ten innocent people than to let one guilty person go free.
You can see this paradigm shift all over the place if you look– from movies and TV shows where a “hero” cop breaks the law to get a confession, to politics where a foreign leader can be framed to justify a war (and torture can be justified as a legitimate part of intelligence gathering), to the courts, where death sentences are imposed on the young and or retarded and children are tried as adults.
Capital punishment is probably the best example of this change. In the first place, it is the most extreme example of why we had the rule in the first place– in theory, any other punishment can be undone if you discover that the wrong person was executed. But more to the point, we have one state where capital punishment was “suspended” because a number of innocent people were identified on death row, with the concomitant presumption that some had been wrongly executed. Under the old rule this would have been enough to stop executions entirely. Under the new rule we have at least one state that is still trying to make executions easier.
Any law enacted by any legislature that reflects this new paradigm would seem to be unconstitutional on the face of it. But if the majority wants such a law, it must be ok. So we go right ahead and allow (even encourage) our government to violate our rights under the 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th amendments in the knowledge that it will take many years for a protest to get to the Supreme Court, and by the time it does the Supreme Court may be nothing more than a judicial arm of a political party. Sometimes it’s ok to torture people (if we hate or fear them enough). Sometimes it’s ok for the police to search your home without a warrant (if they think we might be terrorists). Sometimes it’s ok to lie under oath (if it is to protect national security). The word “sometimes” does not occur in the Constitution, which our leaders have sworn to uphold and defend.
The rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not in the Constitution. Nor is the right to privacy.
Or so they would have you believe, those who want to deny those rights to us. But what about the 9th Amendment, which reads in full “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” Equality, and the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are “self-evident Truths” and inalienable, according to the Declaration of Independence.
The two roles of Justice are to protect the innocent and to punish the guilty. But a majority of us now believe that punishment of the guilty is more important than protection of the innocent. And the majority rules. That’s America.
–SG
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