Government on Steroids

Campus Report ^ | November 13, 2007 | Emmanuel Opati

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Government on Steroids?

by: Emmanuel Opati, November 13, 2007

There is concern that the increasing over-legislation of the justice system by governments is adversely affecting traditional concepts of justice.

Though there is need to ensure an orderly society, it is feared that increased government legislation in the criminal law may limit liberty and individual freedom.

Speaking at the Heritage Foundation on November 5th, Judge Inigo Bing, Circuit Judge of Snaresbrook Crown Court in the United Kingdom (U.K.), said that “criminal law is by its nature authoritarian. And over-criminalization is more consistent with an authoritarian state than with a liberal democratic one.”

Referring to his home country (U.K.), Judge Inigo said this appetite for over-legislation of the criminal law is mainly in response to public opinion.

“It is in many respects an ill-thought-out way of responding to transient public opinion on particular topics,” he added.

He said that a lot of the rushed criminalization is political response to public opinion of specific harmful consequences of actions, such as death.

He argues however, that “harmful consequences cannot in themselves be a crime unless the wrong-doer is capable and the degree of capability in terms intention and recklessness is proportionate to the harm which it results.”

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The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws. - Tacitus, circa AD70.