Our Police State, 9-11-2010 to 9-12-2010 (part 7)

 [Continued from Our Police State, 9-11-2010 to 9-12-2010 (part 6). sch 3/26/23.]

Compare now a government meant to promote life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with the idea of a government interested only in security. What will American society look like then? I would like to think favoring the former changes the police state to one of traffic cop. I do not want to think about what we become if we continue onto a government more focused on security.

I want to add another point from Mere Christianity:

... Human beings, after all, have some sense; they see that you cannot have any real safety or happiness except in a society where everyone plays fair, and it is because they see this that they try to behave decently. Now, of course, it is perfectly true that safety and happiness can only come from individuals, classses, and nations being honest and kind to each other....

("The Reality of the Law")

We live in a society where I believe everyone believes no one plays fair, and they know some do not play fair, and therefore why should anyone play fair? We have, as I wrote above, pitted parts of American society against one another by dehumanizing them and removing the concept of fair from their treatment. I see a great wrenching pain running throughout all of American society, if we try restoring fairness and kindness to our civil discourse. Think on how you can and will do this. Think how you pressure your political representatives to treat all Americans with kindness and fairness. Think how to help your religious institution to spread kindness and fairness.

WE, the people, must decide if we shall continue our government under the ideas of Locke and Jefferson, or those of Ayn Rand. I suggest anyone favoring Rand read Locke and C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity (particularly "Reality of the law" and "We Have Cause to Worry.") If the majority prefer government without the basis of The Declaration, then, please have the honesty to change the basis of American government. You might as well also declare Lincoln's Gettysburg Address a dead letter.

But freedom does not mean no legal punishments. No, sentences should balance the right to freedom of the defendant against the freedom rights of the community. There are habitual violent offenders who impose too much on the freedom of the others. However, sentencing to life someone who violated a three-strikes law by stealing bubble gum, goes too far against the freedom of the defendant without imposing on the community. Let us ask this question: what purpose shall a prison sentence serve?

Following Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, the answer would be with correction and instruction. Using those terms, the punishment should be such that achieves those ends. The federal system just punishes without concern to either correction or instruction. Reading the federal sentencing guidelines shows no provision for correcting a person's faults or instructing them in proper conduct.

The federal sentencing guidelines are simplistic. They appear tough on crime by treating all with equal harshness. The mandatory minimum sentences enhance the politicians' sheen as being tough gang-busters. The offender who might be corrected with probation instead spends years and years with hardened criminals. No matter, the taxpayer foots the bill. Fairness means fairness to all: society and individual. Is it fair that the taxpayers pay for prison when alternatives to detention exist for the less obdurate criminals?

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[Continued in Our Police State, 9-11-2010 to 9-12-2010 (part 8). sch 3/26/23.]