So that, if an unjust law were binding upon a jury in civil suits, a defendant, by resisting the execution of the judgment, could, in effect, convert the civil action into a criminal one, in which the jury would be paramount to the same legislation, to which, in the civil suit, they were subordinate.
Spooner explains how unjust laws can blur the lines between civil and criminal actions for juries.
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On the contrary, they acknowledge themselves robbers, murderers, and villains, pure and simple.
They neither ask, nor expect, any mercy, if they should ever fall into the hands of honest men.
They do not tell us of the almshouses, hospitals, schools, churches, etc., which, out of the purest charity and benevolence, they maintain for our benefit, out of the money they take from us.
They acknowledge it to be our unquestioned right and duty to kill them, if we can; that they expect nothing else, than that we will kill them, if we can; and that we are only fools and cowards, if we do not kill them, by any and every…