It is absurd to say that they have no moral responsibility for the use that may be made of their verdict by the government, when they have reason to suppose it will be used for purposes of injustice.
Lysander Spooner: “It is absurd to say that they have no moral responsibility for the use that may be made of their verdict by the…”
Editor's note · Context
Spooner argues that jurors cannot escape moral accountability for the consequences of their verdicts, especially when they foresee injustice.
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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…
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.
In short, they acknowledge themselves hostes humani generis: enemies of the human race.