Declining spend on Miami justice

From this Miami Herald article, it is apparent that governments stand ready to cut spending on justice because they are simply so wasteful with money.

I think both sides of this debate miss the point.

Yes, the judiciary is important, but that depends upon what it is that the judiciary is enforcing. We had a pretty good common law system, and it was thrown out with the bath water in sympathy to the desires of legislators to develop statutory law. Statutory law is not an objective (rational) standard of justice. It is based on legislature appeasement, concessions/exemptions, etc, as opposed to principles held in context of other principles. It has resulted in justice descending to arbitrary law, which we of course associate with arbitrary authoritarian rule. Democracy is thus merely a legitimatised form of tyranny.

Plans to cut spending on judiciary invoke plans to cut back upon the most important aspect of govt work. Quite the paradox don't you think?

Anthony Lewis on the history of judicial activism

In this video we have some comments by Anthony Lewis on the history of judicial activism.

He appears to dislike the term 'judicial activism', and prefers the term 'bold' or 'courageous' rulings, but in essence there is nothing inherently wrong with the word 'activism'. There is nothing wrong with judges making rulings based on personal values; afterall it would be desirable that judges values are consonant with the facts of reality, and that the laws of the country are correspondingly so as well. The alternative 'conservatism' is really nothing more than 'rationalism'; that is, the assertion of a claim based on floating premises with lack grounding by either the coherence or correspondence theories of truth.

Retiring Justice Sandra Day on Judicial Activism

The judiciary is clearly dismayed by criticism of judges for engaging in 'judicial activism'. These comments from the retiring Justice Sandra Day:

A voice for judicial activism in the USA

Judge Napolitano is the youngest life-tenured Superior Court judge in the history of the State of New Jersey. While on the bench from 1987 to 1995, Judge Napolitano tried more than 150 jury trials and sat in all parts of the Superior Court -- criminal, civil, equity and family. He has handled thousands of sentencings, motions, hearings and divorces. For 11 years, he served as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Seton Hall Law School, where he provided instruction in constitutional law and jurisprudence. In this interview he provides a strong and animated argument for judicial activism....

See Fox News for a complete profile.