Justice

I’ve heard that President Obama reads my blog, so this is totally the way to pitch my idea, and he badly needs a new idea. He still seems like a nice guy to me, and he’s got a great frowny face. I still think he could be the best president ever, and to pull that off he needs to bring about something actually new, not just the neo soup warmed over from the Clinton administration.

I think we’ll get universal single-payer health care and maybe even sane drug laws, but neither of those is a new idea. The only reason they haven’t happened already is that our system functions best as a means of social retardation by perpetuating fears and ignorance. The leading-edgers often end up in jail because social evolution is faster than governmental change. Good for the police, prison, and war industries; not so good for humans. All that can be changed now.

“The jury has the power to bring in a verdict in the teeth of both the law and the facts.” (Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Homing v. District of Columbia, 138 [1920])

Mr. President, here’s my idea: Let’s let juries decide the punishment for a transgression without restriction. A jury could sentence people any way they wanted. Rather than being forced to send a human being to prison for a certain minimum number of years, a jury would be able to sentence the now-victim to anything from public disemboweling to prison to the stocks to deliberate infection to a substantial reward—anything at all—as long as they all agree.

The proceedings will be streamed live, and the advertising revenue will go to me.

Laws are by design inflexible, unlike people; so no more minimums or sentencing guidelines, which institutionalize and perpetuate the anger and fear of the politicians who once had the temerity to tell juries what to do.

Each trial will be from scratch. Each transgression will be dealt with individually, as will each sentence. What exactly does each guilty person deserve? What if he were your friend? Although I think that our consequences should be decided by people who love us, antagonists of the accused would also be encouraged to participate. Some people will have a hard time, some will get away clean, so no change there.

The death penalty will be permitted, but the jury has to do it. If all of them want her dead, one of them has to kill her. That’s justice. Paying bullies and sadists to handle it is cowardly punishment.

A trial will always be held when someone is killed, unless they’re done in by a spouse. Killing your children will not be a crime and neither will killing your spouse. Let’s see what that does for the marriage stats. And, of course, no more victimless crimes.

Did I leave anything out?