On the Right

It’s worth a moment to reflect on the idea of justice gone wild. What comes to mind is lynch justice. Or “vigilante” justice. As an exercise, assume that the jury had freed Louise and that a crowd of angry reactors, pledging the protection of innocents, had stormed into her jail and strung her up. Their excuse, if they were detected and arraigned, would have been that they were correcting an abuse of justice. The prosecutors would point out to the jury that abuses of justice can’t be put in the hands of mobs. But what happened in Boston was an orderly reaction against an alleged miscarriage of justice at the hands of a scholarly and sedate judge.

Much of the United States and all of Great Britain is wild with grateful glee. The contention there, sometimes spoken, everywhere implied, is that but for the judge, a terrible injustice would have been accepted-15 years in jail (minimum). If this were so, then anger might have reasonably developed against the perpetrators of injustice, the jury. But here the confusion mounts, because, in his edict, the judge took pains to exonerate the jurors: indeed he thanked them profusely for their work.

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William F. Buckley Jr.

William F. Buckley Jr. founded National Review magazine in 1955.

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William F. Buckley Jr.

It’s worth a moment to reflect on the idea of justice gone wild. What comes to mind is lynch justice. Or “vigilante” justice. As an exercise, assume that the jury had freed Louise and that a crowd of angry reactors, pledging the protection of innocents, had stormed into her jail and strung her up. Their excuse, if they were detected and arraigned, would have been that they were correcting an abuse of justice. The prosecutors would point out to the jury that abuses of justice can’t be put in the hands of mobs. But what happened in Boston was an orderly reaction against an alleged miscarriage of justice at the hands of a scholarly and sedate judge.

Much of the United States and all of Great Britain is wild with grateful glee. The contention there, sometimes spoken, everywhere implied, is that but for the judge, a terrible injustice would have been accepted-15 years in jail (minimum). If this were so, then anger might have reasonably developed against the perpetrators of injustice, the jury. But here the confusion mounts, because, in his edict, the judge took pains to exonerate the jurors: indeed he thanked them profusely for their work.