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No. One of the most longstanding principles of functional legal systems is that the law must be capable of being obeyed. (See Lon Fuller's famous book "The Mor
by paultopia 8y ago
No.
One of the most longstanding principles of functional legal systems is that the law must be capable of being obeyed. (See Lon Fuller's famous book "The Morality of Law" for the canonical discussion.)
When legal rules are literally impossible to obey for some people, they cease acting as legal rules and just become status crimes. If it's illegal to sleep outdoors, then anyone who doesn't have the money to sleep indoors becomes a criminal no matter what they do.
If you're seriously interested in engaging with this question, I've written about it some from pp. 1059 onward of this law review article.[1] Jeremy Waldron, a really important philosopher of law, has also written several articles on the subject, his "Homelessness and the Issue of Freedom" is particularly important.
[1] http://paul-gowder.com/Equal_Law_in_an_Unequal_World.pdf http://paul-gowder.com/Equal_Law_in_an_Unequal_World.pdf
- modells 8y agoSmh. Zero tolerance is zero thinking is zero humanity. Common-sense by discretion must prevail where 8+ million are locked-up, the most overcriminalized country with the most prisoner per-capita in the world, save Seychelles. As John Oliver pointed out, DA's are elected based on "tough on crime" nonsense, have all of the power to decide whom/how to prosecute and there aren't enough public defenders so the majority of people plead guilty, even if they're innocent, because they have no hope of fighting a system that is broken and doesn't provide either a speedy trial or adequate representation.