Your position and view towards the law is admirable and very worthy of respect, but you are holding him to a standard that is not applicable within a legal system based on the traditions English common law, like the American one. You’re describing the role of a judge in an inquisitorial system, not an adversarial system.
The role of a judge in an inquisitorial system is to answer the questions “Did they do it? Do they deserve to be punished?”
In the traditional English system, the is the role of the jury. The judge is just there to ensure everyone is playing by the rules of the court.
Of course, it is impossible for anyone to be truly divested from personal opinion and bias. We are all human, after all. The guiding design principle of an inquisitorial system is that judges are expected to be as neutral as possible, and then the legal system presumed they succeeded. An adversarial system, on the other hand, is aware of the inherent biases of mankind and attempts to design around them.
Which approach is more valid is a long-running topic of debate in philosophy.
I just can’t countenance your open and blatant endorsement of cravenness and corruption running the DoJ. Oh, and your patronizing tone is nothing short of insulting.
If your best argument is that there’s no legal requirement to do this correct and just thing - the moral and ethical thing - you’ve only made yourself look as inept and corrupt as Gorsuch.
You’re free to disagree with the way the American legal system is structured. I’m not here to argue with you, and in many ways, I actually agree with you wholeheartedly that Garland would make a terrible judge in my notion of an ideal legal system.
The role of a judge in an inquisitorial system is to answer the questions “Did they do it? Do they deserve to be punished?”
In the traditional English system, this is the role of the jury. The judge is just there to ensure everyone is playing by the rules of the court. And in that role, Garland is pretty suitable. And yes, a sense of fairness and impartiality is not strictly required. Just a sense of logic, which Garland definitely has. You can correctly describe that as a fault of the legal system.
I apologise if you find this insulting.
Think of the judge in My Cousin Vinny. Do you think that he walked into that courtroom every day thinking “these idiots definitely did it”? It’s very likely he did. But he also recognised it wasn’t his job to broadcast that to the court. He had to put on a mask of neutrality because he recognised that it is the jury’s role to determine guilt, not his. He doesn’t need to be truly impartial to the defence’s case; he just needs to make the correct evidentiary and legal rulings. Which he mostly did.
Contrast that to the role of the prosecutor, which is what the attorney-general is. It’s the prosecutor’s job to come into court thinking “these guys are guilty” and convince the jury of the same.
That’s a lot of words I’m not gonna read— but I don’t need your permission nor your approval to disagree with you.
And, since your patronizing tone has graduated to condescending, don’t bother replying. Nothing you have to say hold the value to me, so I’ll just downvote your comment without reading it.
Your position and view towards the law is admirable and very worthy of respect, but you are holding him to a standard that is not applicable within a legal system based on the traditions English common law, like the American one. You’re describing the role of a judge in an inquisitorial system, not an adversarial system.
The role of a judge in an inquisitorial system is to answer the questions “Did they do it? Do they deserve to be punished?”
In the traditional English system, the is the role of the jury. The judge is just there to ensure everyone is playing by the rules of the court.
Of course, it is impossible for anyone to be truly divested from personal opinion and bias. We are all human, after all. The guiding design principle of an inquisitorial system is that judges are expected to be as neutral as possible, and then the legal system presumed they succeeded. An adversarial system, on the other hand, is aware of the inherent biases of mankind and attempts to design around them.
Which approach is more valid is a long-running topic of debate in philosophy.
Thank you for a solid, informative explanation. Any judge must be impartial and resistant to their own biases, which is not an easy task.
I just can’t countenance your open and blatant endorsement of cravenness and corruption running the DoJ. Oh, and your patronizing tone is nothing short of insulting.
If your best argument is that there’s no legal requirement to do this correct and just thing - the moral and ethical thing - you’ve only made yourself look as inept and corrupt as Gorsuch.
You’re free to disagree with the way the American legal system is structured. I’m not here to argue with you, and in many ways, I actually agree with you wholeheartedly that Garland would make a terrible judge in my notion of an ideal legal system.
The role of a judge in an inquisitorial system is to answer the questions “Did they do it? Do they deserve to be punished?”
In the traditional English system, this is the role of the jury. The judge is just there to ensure everyone is playing by the rules of the court. And in that role, Garland is pretty suitable. And yes, a sense of fairness and impartiality is not strictly required. Just a sense of logic, which Garland definitely has. You can correctly describe that as a fault of the legal system.
I apologise if you find this insulting.
Think of the judge in My Cousin Vinny. Do you think that he walked into that courtroom every day thinking “these idiots definitely did it”? It’s very likely he did. But he also recognised it wasn’t his job to broadcast that to the court. He had to put on a mask of neutrality because he recognised that it is the jury’s role to determine guilt, not his. He doesn’t need to be truly impartial to the defence’s case; he just needs to make the correct evidentiary and legal rulings. Which he mostly did.
Contrast that to the role of the prosecutor, which is what the attorney-general is. It’s the prosecutor’s job to come into court thinking “these guys are guilty” and convince the jury of the same.
That’s a lot of words I’m not gonna read— but I don’t need your permission nor your approval to disagree with you.
And, since your patronizing tone has graduated to condescending, don’t bother replying. Nothing you have to say hold the value to me, so I’ll just downvote your comment without reading it.
Enjoy voting for Trump.
Okay, have a good day. I voted for Harris.
👍