ONE:There are some crimes which are at the same time of common occurrence and of difficult proof. In them the difficulty of proof is equivalent to a probability of innocence; and the harm of their impunity being so much the less to be considered as their frequency depends on principles other than the risk of punishment, the time for inquiry and the period of prescription ought both to be proportionately less. Yet[161] cases of adultery and pederasty, both of difficult proof, are precisely those in which, according to received principles, tyrannical presumptions of quasi-proofs and half-proofs are allowed to prevail (as if a man could be half-innocent or half-guilty, in other words, half-punishable or half-acquittable); in which torture exercises its cruel sway over the person of the accused, over the witnesses, and even over the whole family of an unfortunate wretch, according to the coldly wicked teaching of some doctors of law, who set themselves up as the rule and standard for judges to follow.
ONE:CHAPTER XXX. THEFTS.Given the necessity of the aggregation of mankind, and given the covenants which necessarily result from the very opposition of private interests, a scale of offences may be traced, beginning with those which tend directly to the destruction of society, and ending with acts of the smallest possible injustice committed against individual members of it. Between these extremes are comprised all the actions opposed to the public welfare which are called crimes, and which by imperceptible degrees decrease in enormity from the highest to the lowest. If the infinite and obscure combinations of human actions admitted of mathematical treatment, there ought to be a corresponding scale of punishments, varying from the severest to the slightest penalty. If there were an exact and universal scale of crimes and punishments, we should have an approximate and general test by[199] which to gauge the degrees of tyranny and liberty in different governments, the relative state of the humanity or wickedness of different nations. But the wise legislator will rest satisfied with marking out the principal divisions in such a scale, so as not to invert their order, nor to affix to crimes of the first degree punishments due to those of the last.
ONE:I speak of probability in connection with crimes, which, to deserve punishment, ought to be proved. But the paradox is only apparent, if one reflects that, strictly speaking, moral certainty is only a probability, but a probability which is called certainty, because every sensible person necessarily assents to it, by a force of habit which arises from the necessity of acting, and which is prior to all speculation. The certainty requisite for certifying that a man is a criminal is, therefore, the same that determines everyone in the most important actions of his life. The proofs of a crime may be divided into perfect and imperfect, the former being of such a[136] nature as exclude the possibility of a mans innocence, and the latter such as fall short of this certainty. Of the first kind one proof alone is sufficient for condemnation; of the second, or imperfect kind, as many are necessary as suffice to make a single perfect proof; that is to say, when, though each proof taken separately does not exclude the possibility of innocence, yet their convergence on the same point makes such innocence impossible. But let it be noted that imperfect proofs, from which an accused has it in his power to justify himself and declines to do so, become perfect. This moral certainty of proofs, however, is easier to feel than to define with exactitude: for which reason I think that the best law is one which attaches to the chief judge assessors, taken by lot, not by selection, there being in this case more safety in the ignorance which judges by sentiment than in the knowledge which judges by opinion. Where the laws are clear and precise, the function of a judge consists solely in the certification of fact. If for searching out the proofs of a crime ability and cleverness are required, and if in the presentation of the result clearness and precision are essential, all that is required to judge of the result is simple and common good sense, a faculty which is less fallacious than the learning of a judge, accustomed as he is to wish to find men guilty and to reduce everything to an artificial system borrowed from his studies. Happy the nation where the[137] laws are not a science! It is a most useful law that everyone shall be judged by his equals, because where a citizens liberty and fortune are at stake those sentiments which inequality inspires should have no voice; that feeling of superiority with which the prosperous man regards the unfortunate one, and that feeling of dislike with which an inferior regards his superior, have no scope in a judgment by ones equals. But when the crime in question is an offence against a person of a different rank from the accused, then one half of the judges should be the equals of the accused, the other half equals of the plaintiff, that so, every private interest being balanced, by which the appearances of things are involuntarily modified, only the voice of the laws and of truth may be heard. It is also in accordance with justice that an accused person should have power up to a certain point of refusing judges whom he may suspect; and if he is allowed the exercise of this power for some time without opposition, he will seem to condemn himself. Verdicts should be public, and the proofs of guilt public, in order that opinionwhich is, perhaps, the only bond of society there ismay place a check on outbursts of force and passion, and that the people may say, We are not slaves without defence: a feeling which both inspires them with courage and is as good as a tribute to a sovereign who understands his real interest. I refrain from pointing out other details and precautions which[138] require similar regulations. I should have said nothing at all, had it been necessary for me to say everything.The lighting of a city by night at the public expense; the distribution of guards in the different quarters; simple moral discourses on religion, but only in the silent and holy quiet of churches, protected by public authority; speeches on behalf of private and public interests in national assemblies, parliaments, or wherever else the majesty of sovereignty residesall these are efficacious means for preventing the dangerous condensation of popular passions. These means are a principal branch of that magisterial vigilance which the French call police; but if this is exercised by arbitrary laws, not laid down in a code of general circulation, a door is opened to tyranny,[221] which ever surrounds all the boundaries of political liberty. I find no exception to this general axiom, that Every citizen ought to know when his actions are guilty or innocent. If censors, and arbitrary magistrates in general, are necessary in any government, it is due to the weakness of its constitution, and is foreign to the nature of a well organised government. More victims have been sacrificed to obscure tyranny by the uncertainty of their lot than by public and formal cruelty, for the latter revolts mens minds more than it abases them. The true tyrant always begins by mastering opinion, the precursor of courage; for the latter can only show itself in the clear light of truth, in the fire of passion, or in ignorance of danger.
