The safety of society, which is the only object of the criminal law, requires only that those acts which are understood by mankind at large to be intrinsically criminal, should he punished as crimes.
He asserts that criminal law should only punish acts widely recognized as criminal.
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Yet the codes of the most celebrated kings are very small, and were little more than compilations of immemorial customs.
Proud from victory, and with their swords in their hands, would they surrender their liberties to a private man?
It is also sheer impudence, on their part, to assume that their commands are at all necessary to teach other men what is, and what is not, justice.
The people are no more arrayed against themselves, when a jury puts its veto upon a statute, which the other tribunals have sanctioned, than they are when the same veto is exercised by the representatives, the senate, the executive, or the…