The Holocaust, War, Justifiable Homicide, and War

[Vince1022]

I assure you that if one reads that commandment as you do (killing is wrong - period), without qualification, then we are breaking God’s commandments everytime we cook an egg (we killed an unborn chicken, assuming it was a fertizied egg), step on a roach, pick vegetables, etc.

This is an interesting and thought-provoking interpretation of Scripture, but I am not aware of any Catholic or Jewish scholars who hold to such.

Are you suggesting this Commandment applies equally to humans and non-humans (regarding of who or what is “killed”)? Really? Any Church or traditional (Catholic or Jewish) teaching to support this idea?

thank you.

 

[Salvatore123]

Vince,

Taken from the Cathechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition:

2322 From its conception, the child has the right to life. Direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, is a “criminal” practice (GS 27 § 3), gravely contrary to the moral law. The Church imposes the canonical penalty of excommunication for this crime against human life.

I just don’t see how or even WHY you are trying to distinguish between “human life” “human being” and “human person”, when not only does the Catechism itself use the words/terms interchangeably, but you have yet to demonstrate to me the difference.

In the above quote, the church clearly states that A CHILD has a right to life. It does NOT distinguish between unborn or born - it says “CHILD”. That same paragraph later goes on to point out that, based on the fact that A CHILD has a right to life, excommunication results for a crime against HUMAN LIFE.

THEY ARE SYNONYMOUS.

To hopefully put an end to this (which I think is bordering on absurdity): please - and I really mean this - PLEASE tell me the difference, FROM A CATHOLIC THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE the difference between: “human life” “human being” and “human person”.

Please . . .

 

[Vince1022]

Homicide, by definition, is morally neutral: it is the killing of a human being. No more, no less.

This is a secular definition, right?

How does such cohere with Catholic teaching?

Thanks.

 

[Vince1022]

Homicide that is NOT justified is called “murder”, and is thus, illegal.

ok, so people may define homicide and murder and illegality as such. What is the Christian response?

 

[Vince1022]

Thus defined, homicide IS morally and ethically neutral,.

I am simply and honestly looking for any Catholic Church teaching that teaches such.

Thanks.

 

[Vince1022]

Vince,

Taken from the Cathechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition:

2322 From its conception, the child has the right to life. Direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, is a “criminal” practice (GS 27 § 3), gravely contrary to the moral law. The Church imposes the canonical penalty of excommunication for this crime against human life.

I just don’t see how or even WHY you are trying to distinguish between “human life” “human being” and “human person”, when not only does the Catechism itself use the words/terms interchangeably, but you have yet to demonstrate to me the difference.

In the above quote, the church clearly states that A CHILD has a right to life. It does NOT distinguish between unborn or born - it says “CHILD”. That same paragraph later goes on to point out that, based on the fact that A CHILD has a right to life, excommunication results for a crime against HUMAN LIFE.

THEY ARE SYNONYMOUS.

To hopefully put an end to this (which I think is bordering on absurdity): please - and I really mean this - PLEASE tell me the difference, FROM A CATHOLIC THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE the difference between: “human life” “human being” and “human person”.

Please . . .

Right. No distinction between human life, person, child in the Catechism para you note.

As you note the Catholic Church imposes a penalty based on “human life” (not a human person, or human being, etc.) Exactly my point.

Hope this helps!

 

[Salvatore123]

Vince, you said (your words are italicized):

1. *"Yes, of course. I agree. But I still don’t see where the Catholic Church teaches that killing a person is morally neutral. Can you clarify?

In the (extreme) hypothetical act you proposed, well, ok, you may not be acting immorally, personally, but I fail to see how that means killing a person is morally neutral. Killing an innocent person is intrinsically wrong, isn’t it? Thank you."*

First, there is nothing “extreme” in the hypos I presented. Hundreds (perhaps thousands) of people are killed every year while hunting or at work sites, and I can assure you that in the case of accidents, NO ONE intended to kill someone else.

Second, an act is either moral, immoral, or neutral. It is moral when one acts in accordance with God’s wishes and laws. It is immoral when one acts not in accordance with God’s wishes and laws. That leaves only “neutral”. How in the world can you say that killing a person is “instrincally wrong” if the death was caused by someone who had absolutely no idea that his act might kill someone AND did not even know his act DID kill someone?

What if a volcano errupted and lava killed a bystander? Are you going to suggest that the volcano was acting immorally? As a volcano is not alive, does not possess a soul, and cannot “act” with volition, then a volcano cannot be judged to be moral or immoral.

Well, how is that different from a person who does something such as dumping out garbage (as in my hypothetical) and a person is struck in the head and killed by the garbage, because that person failed to heed warning signs to not go near the chute?

The death of ALL people are morally neutral if one cannot assign a cause of death attributed to someone who acted contrary to God’s law. Only people can act morally or immorally. When I refer to “death” or “killing of a person” (both of which can be caused by nature or other people) in a vacuum, it is impossible to say that the killing or death is anything BUT neutral, if we do not know the intent of the person acting and the circumstances of the death.

I cannot get any more basic than this.

Again - this is high school/freshmal level philosophy/theology.

1. “Well, one easy example is abortion. Many people perform or cooperate with abortion without the desire to kill anyone and without the personal knowledge that they killed anyone. Regardless, the Catholic Church defines abortion as a mortal sin.”

Vince, unless someone is an mentally deficient, does not care, or obstinately refuses to recogize an unborn child as a human being, that person CANNOT claim that performing an abortion is not = to killing a human being.

It is really that simple. If, as the Church does, define a human being, as a fertilized egg, then the intentional destruction of that fertilized egg is abortion.

1. “Are you suggesting this Commandment applies equally to humans and non-humans (regarding of who or what is “killed”)? Really? Any Church or traditional (Catholic or Jewish) teaching to support this idea?”

No, Vince - I am not suggesting this at all. I am saying that YOU are suggesting it by stating that the commandment prohibits killing IN ALL CIRCUMSTANCES. If you are going to read the commandment literally, without any benefit of application or interpretation, then you get to the absurd result that, as the commandment does not say WHO or WHAT you cannot kill, then you can be “guilty” of killing microbes everytime you walk or sit down.

I certainly hope you are not making such an argument . . .

1. “Ok, so people may define homicide and murder and illegality as such. What is the Christian response?”

See the following taken from the Catechism:

2263 The legitimate defense of persons and societies is not an exception to the prohibition against the murder of the innocent that constitutes intentional killing. “The act of self-defense can have a double effect: the preservation of one’s own life; and the killing of the aggressor. . . . The one is intended, the other is not.”

This section clearly states that people, in certain circumstances, may, in the legitimate defense of persons (that is, justifiable homicide) or societies (that is, just war), are not MURDERING anyone, because they are not intending to necessarily kill anyone. They act with the intent of protecting - killing is a “by product” of that act. Thus, it is permissible to kill people in certain limited circumstances.

Again - this is basic theology/philosophy.

1. “As you note the Catholic Church imposes a penalty based on “human life” (not a human person, or human being, etc.) Exactly my point.”

Vince, in an attempt to try to be fair and not lose my cool, I will answer this one last time.

You continue, without any support, to attempt to distinguish between a “human being”, “human life”, and a “human person”.

I just presented to you a pargraph where the words are interchangeable.

I think the burden is now ON YOU to tell me the difference between a “human person” a “human being” and “human life”.

As far as I know, a homosapien who is alive is a human being, a human person, and an example of human life.

I am still waiting PATIENTLY (although mine is waning) for your explanation as to how these three phrases are different.

I really don’t get why you are so hung up on abortion being immoral because it kills a “human life” but you do not think it is the same as killing a “human being”.

Good grief man! If “human life” and a “human being” are not the same, what is their difference (assuming the human being is alive and not someone lying in a casket for his or her own funeral)???

If you want to reply and point out where you think I am incorrect - have at it.

I am finished . . .

 

[Hastrman]

As you note the Catholic Church imposes a penalty based on “human life” (not a human person, or human being, etc.) Exactly my point.

Human persons are those lifeforms that belong to the species “Homo sapiens” (possibly also to some extinct Homo species); therefore human life and human person are precisely coterminous—the soul is not the person, it is the personality, the thing that makes a person a person.

And those human persons are, of course, human beings, since everything that exists is a being and the type of being they are is human. A rock is also a being, a mineral being.

Thus, “a human life”, “a human person”, and “a human being” are interchangeable, for virtually all purposes.

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

…
Can someone please tell me why it would be okay for me to shoot someone who was about to hit my child with an axe, but I am told it would NOT be okay for me to shoot someone who is about to insert a vacuum device inside of a woman’s uterus for the purpose of killing her unborn child?

Sloppy argument, for someone with a law degree. (I have a law license as well, as you put it, I mention this not to brag - it is simply for information/background on me for the reader of this thread). Your use of the word “okay” in the OP seems a deliberate blurring of civil law and moral law which certainly do not overlap.

Civil law defines abortion and murder differently than does your faith. An argument over definitions is bound to go nowhere because how one determines what is moral on one hand and legal on the other will employ different objective and subjective standards.

Bad historical analogies too. But I can help, you should ask “why, if the air war waged by the Allies could burn out over 60 Japanese cities and kill millions of Japanese noncombatants, can’t I kill an abortionist.” There, much, much stronger, more focused. Just as wrong, but still, a better way of framing false issues.

 

[Salvatore123]

Resevoir,

It is NOT a “sloppy argument” if one assumes (as I thought most people would - I apparently assumed wrongly), as I did, that I was not asking for a comparison between civil/criminal law of a state and moral/ethical law of my faith.

This is a Catholic Forum - I KNOW we cannot “square” one type of law with the other.

Yet I still have not seen ONE answer, from ONLY A MORAL/ETHICAL CATHOLIC perspective, that explains why it is okay for me to use deadly force (if that is the ONLY way) to prevent the murder of my child by a burglar, but it is not okay to kill an abortionist who is (and I will make it personal) about to perform an abortion on my underage daughter (again - if that is the ONLY way to prevent him).

And, no - saying, “well, killing one will only result in the woman going to another one”, doesn’t cut it. That makes no more sense that saying, “well, might as well not kill this soldier in a just war, as the enemy is only going to send in a replacement”.

As far as your Japanese analogy, I know of no pronouncement by my Church that fire-bombing Japan before we incinerated Hiroshima and Nagasaki (which, by the way, had a significant Catholic population) with atomic bombs, was morally wrong. As we understood the “oriental mindset” based on experience and the way they dealt with civilian and military populations in China after it was invaded by Japan, America had the view that ALL Japanese (not infants, of course) would fight to the death if we had to invade the island. We you realize that the Japanese had almost 20,000 troops at the Battle for Iwo Jima and ended with only 216 captured, that is pretty telling . . .

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

…
Yet I still have not seen ONE answer, from ONLY A MORAL/ETHICAL CATHOLIC perspective, that explains why it is okay for me to use deadly force (if that is the ONLY way) to prevent the murder of my child by a burglar, but it is not okay to kill an abortionist who is (and I will make it personal) about to perform an abortion on my underage daughter (again - if that is the ONLY way to prevent him)… . .

Well, you’re the only one who can see through your eyes, but I’ve seen several good answers in this thread. As for not being able to distinguish between the moral defense of others and a penal code definition of murder, I fear for your future clients if you try that defense.

Firebombing 60 cities was arguably against your CCC injunction against use of means that produce evils graver than the evil to be eliminated.

 

[Salvatore123]

Reservoir,

My “point” in starting this thread was basically illustrating my opinion that I think a great number of Catholics (who elected Obama - polling statistics show that he would not have won without Catholic votes) simply will not vote for Candidate A, even if it meant ending abortion - where it would flourish under Candidate B. Hell, they couldn’t help themselves from voting for a man (Obama) who supported legislation that would have PREVENTED a doctor from rendering any live saving measures to a baby who had survived abortion. Any explanation for Catholics (or Anglicans) for voting for such a man?

I readily admit that I have much to answer for when I die - supporting a man who supports jabbing scissors into the neck of a full term baby as he or she is being delivered is not one of them.

Regarding your reference to “my clients” - I do not handle criminal defense work for many reasons, one of which is defending someone I know to be guilty. I simply cannot do it. If that makes me a bad attorney, then so be it (along with quite a few other attorneys I know). You say, “As for not being able to distinguish between the moral defense of others and a penal code definition of murder, I fear for your future clients if you try that defense.” I can easily distinguish between the two. As I said before - I thought I made it clear that I was NOT attempting to compare/contrast the two. My questions were posed PURELY on moral/ethical/religious grounds from a predominantly Catholic view, aimed at obtaining a “Catholic” answer.

Finally, the CCC was written approximately 40 years after the end of WWII (with 20-20 hindsight). If what the Allies did was so atrocious (as a whole - not individual acts of inhumanity), I think the Vatican would have condemned the Allies rather than give thanks that WWII had ended and that the Axis powers had been defeated. I don’t recall any “conditional thanks”.

P.S. I realize that the Catholic Church teaches that we, as citizens in a “civilized world” (I try not to laugh too hard when I say that), have a “duty” to follow legitimate civil authority. I respectfully suggest that anyone who cites this “duty”, tell that to those Jews who survived Hitler’s rule in Germany, where it WAS legal (based on the Nuremberg and subsequent laws) to do what the German hierarchy did to the Jews. I can assure you that Sts. Maximilian Kolbe and Edith Stein did not enjoy their “camp visit”.

As an attorney YOU should realize that the War Crimes Trials were the first real attempts ever made in history (that we know of) at trying to hold accountable people from two countries who perpetrated attrocities against people in their own land, where we relied on “natural law” - a “law” that does not exist except in the mind of man given to him by God.

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

…
Regarding your reference to “my clients” - I do not handle criminal defense work for many reasons, one of which is defending someone I know to be guilty. I simply cannot do it.

Guilt is a matter of what the government can or cannot prove. So don’t ask a client if he did it. Most criminal defense is finding the right plea. Don’t let a client perjure himself under oath, surely you know how an unsworn statement is done. The government still has to overcome the presumption of innocence. Everyone has a right to that.

Finally, the CCC was written approximately 40 years after the end of WWII (with 20-20 hindsight). If what the Allies did was so atrocious (as a whole - not individual acts of inhumanity), I think the Vatican would have condemned the Allies rather than give thanks that WWII had ended and that the Axis powers had been defeated. I don’t recall any “conditional thanks”.

I assumed the CCC dated back to the Council of Trent and has been a plain statement of natural law as Catholics see it. The air war against Japan and unrestricted submarine warfare by the USN were arguably war crimes themselves, and silence by the Vatican isn’t an argument one way or the other. I’m sure I could find Catholic theologians who believe such were crimes. Personally, I’m hardly in a position to disapprove of the conduct of the war and that if you don’t want your country laid waste, don’t start a war.
…

As an attorney YOU should realize that the War Crimes Trials were the first real attempts ever made in history (that we know of) at trying to hold accountable people from two countries who perpetrated attrocities against people in their own land, where we relied on “natural law” - a “law” that does not exist except in the mind of man given to him by God.

Bonaparte on St. Helena might disagree.

There were numerous war crimes tribunals, not just two. They were going to hang some people one way or the other and needed to put Axis atrocities into some kind of framework to make sense of the reasons for punishment.

But --formulations of natural law do not necessarily rely on God as their source and I don’t think you’ll find any reference to God in the Nuremberg Principles (codification of the rules developed at those trials) or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, or for that matter, and of the international statements on human rights since then. You can say that God is the source of all human rights, but there are many who say otherwise.

 

[Salvatore123]

If the following (from the CCC) does not state that “natural law” comes, ultimately, from God, then I don’t know what does:

"1955 The “divine and natural” law shows man the way to follow so as to practice the good and attain his end. The natural law states the first and essential precepts which govern the moral life. It hinges upon the desire for God and submission to him, who is the source and judge of all that is good, as well as upon the sense that the other is one’s equal. Its principal precepts are expressed in the Decalogue. This law is called “natural,” not in reference to the nature of irrational beings, but because reason which decrees it properly belongs to human nature:

Where then are these rules written, if not in the book of that light we call the truth? In it is written every just law; from it the law passes into the heart of the man who does justice, not that it migrates into it, but that it places its imprint on it, like a seal on a ring that passes onto wax, without leaving the ring. The natural law is nothing other than the light of understanding placed in us by God; through it we know what we must do and what we must avoid. God has given this light or law at the creation."

You said: “You can say that God is the source of all human rights, but there are many who say otherwise.”

I don’t “say it” - the Catholic Church does . . . I just believe it .

P.S. Odd that those who testified under oath at the War Crimes tribunals (at least in Germany) tooks oaths where they swore BY GOD to tell the truth . . .

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

… The natural law is nothing other than the light of understanding placed in us by God; through it we know what we must do and what we must avoid. God has given this light or law at the creation."

You said: “You can say that God is the source of all human rights, but there are many who say otherwise.”

I don’t “say it” - the Catholic Church does . . . I just believe it .

Circular reasoning won’t win many arguments.

P.S. Odd that those who testified under oath at the War Crimes tribunals (at least in Germany) tooks oaths where they swore BY GOD to tell the truth . . .

If you’re a lawyer you’d know the purpose of an oath, and what a non-religious affirmation is, and that a good number of those witnesses were stone cold atheists.

 

[Salvatore123]

Resevoir,

I am hoping we are not going too far astray from the purpose of my OP. With that caveat,

1. You said: “Civil law defines abortion and murder differently than does your faith. An argument over definitions is bound to go nowhere because how one determines what is moral on one hand and legal on the other will employ different objective and subjective standards.”

What, then, prevents a country from passing a secular law that leaves out certain “peoples” in its definition of those who can be mistreated or even killed for no reason other than WHO they are? And what basis would other countries be able to “topple” their leadership and “convict” them? Their law? (obviously not - THEIR law made it legal). Our country’s law? (again, obviously not - the law in the US could hardly be a basis to convict the leadership or people of another country for violating US law in their own country.

So what, then, would YOU turn to?

I submit that definitions are EVERYTHING when it comes to application of law. The question is WHOSE definition will YOU use?

1. You said, “Circular reasoning won’t win many arguments.”

What I said was not a circular argument. I simply quoted the CCC because YOU cited it for authority to supposedly back up your claim that, under the CCC, the US’s firebombing of Japan violated the Catholic Church’s teachings on proportionality in war.

My point is that you (and as a lawyer, YOU should know this - as you have told me several times) can’t cite a given work, cherry pick from it what you like, use it against someone, and then when it is cited back to you, you suddenly say, “well that’s using a circular argument”.

Either you rely on the CCC or you don’t. It all came from one source - the Vatican. It was not piecemeal.

1. Finally - yes, I do realize that a great many people who do not believe in God, nevertheless take an oath (and the part of the oath in court that is changed is not “under God” - it is the “I swear” part; the biblical “prohibition” against “swearing” is changed to “I affirm”. “so help me God” remains - at least in Louisiana).

So if, as you suggest, that swearing or affirming “so help me God” is really meaningless, then why do it or require it? Again, as an attorney, you should realize that by adding “so help me God”, the government is attempting to “awaken” one’s conscience so that one will think twice before lying before God. If there are really atheists, and they really do not believe in God, I, personally, will have a hard time believing just about anything they say.

And I think a jury would as well

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

hi, Sal,

Resevoir,

I am hoping we are not going too far astray from the purpose of my OP. With that caveat,

1. You said: “Civil law defines abortion and murder differently than does your faith. An argument over definitions is bound to go nowhere because how one determines what is moral on one hand and legal on the other will employ different objective and subjective standards.”

What, then, prevents a country from passing a secular law that leaves out certain “peoples” in its definition of those who can be mistreated or even killed for no reason other than WHO they are? And what basis would other countries be able to “topple” their leadership and “convict” them? Their law? (obviously not - THEIR law made it legal). Our country’s law? (again, obviously not - the law in the US could hardly be a basis to convict the leadership or people of another country for violating US law in their own country.

So what, then, would YOU turn to?

Nothing would prevent a country from enacting those laws, its been done many times. What the Axis did in WW2 being a prime example. During those trials, the application of laws ex post facto (concept of war crimes defined after the war ended) was a valid defense, although ultimately not allowed. The Nuremberg Principles that followed and all of the UN treaties on human rights assert that human rights emanate from the nature of man without reference to a Creator. See, Geneva Convention 4 and the first two protocols. Look at the Kosovo and Rwanda war crimes tribunals.

I submit that definitions are EVERYTHING when it comes to application of law. The question is WHOSE definition will YOU use?

my state’s penal code, the title 18 United States Code for a start. I like you Catholics, but I don’t want to live in a state organized around your Church, I’d be found hanging from a lamp post sooner or later.

1. You said, “Circular reasoning won’t win many arguments.”

What I said was not a circular argument. I simply quoted the CCC because YOU cited it for authority to supposedly back up your claim that, under the CCC, the US’s firebombing of Japan violated the Catholic Church’s teachings on proportionality in war.

That would be fun, let’s brief the question of whether unrestricted submarine warfare in the Pacific and the air war against Japan violated the principles of just war.

My point is that you (and as a lawyer, YOU should know this - as you have told me several times) can’t cite a given work, cherry pick from it what you like, use it against someone, and then when it is cited back to you, you suddenly say, “well that’s using a circular argument”.

Anyone can go to law school.

Either you rely on the CCC or you don’t. It all came from one source - the Vatican. It was not piecemeal.

I don’t rely on the CCC for anything, since I’m not RC. I pointed out that the USN and the USAAF had arguably violated your Church’s teachings on unjust war.

1. Finally - yes, I do realize that a great many people who do not believe in God, nevertheless take an oath (and the part of the oath in court that is changed is not “under God” - it is the “I swear” part; the biblical “prohibition” against “swearing” is changed to “I affirm”. “so help me God” remains - at least in Louisiana).

An affirmation – Its also for atheists, who don’t want to swear on a bible. The entire swearing ritual is a reminder for the witness of the importance of telling the truth and the consequences of perjury.

So if, as you suggest, that swearing or affirming “so help me God” is really meaningless, then why do it or require it? Again, as an attorney, you should realize that by adding “so help me God”, the government is attempting to “awaken” one’s conscience so that one will think twice before lying before God. If there are really atheists, and they really do not believe in God, I, personally, will have a hard time believing just about anything they say.

And I think a jury would as well

swearing on a bible and saying “so help me God” is not required. You’ll want to see FRCP 43(b) and these comments on a preliminary draft of this rule:

"In explanation of this portion of the draft the Advisory Committee’s Note reads:

ADVISORY COMMITTEE’S NOTE

'The rule is designed to afford the flexibility required in dealing with religious adults, atheists, conscientious objectors, mental defectives, and children. Affirmation is simply a solemn undertaking to tell the truth; no special verbal formula is required. As is true generally, affirmation is recognized by federal law. ‘Oath’ includes affirmation, 1 U.S.C. 1; judges and clerks may administer oaths and affirmations, 28 U.S.C. 459, 953; and affirmations are acceptable in lieu of oaths under Rule 43(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Perjury by a witness is a crime, 18 U.S.C. 1621."

And, generally, US v Looper 419 F.2d 1405 (1969)

“If defendant’s religious beliefs made repugnant or impossible to him an appeal to God or the raising of a hand as part of an oath or affirmation (and in this regard, his statement was to be believed), all the district judge need do is to make inquiry as to what form of oath or affirmation would not offend defendant’s religious beliefs but would give rise to a duty to speak the truth. The district judge could qualify defendant to testify in any form which stated or symbolized that defendant would tell the truth and which, under defendant’s religious beliefs, purported to impress on him the necessity for so doing.”

Basic stuff. Have you tried many cases?

 

[Salvatore123]

Yes, I have tried a few - over a hundred during almost 20 years.

You have to understand where I am from and where I practice: my area (where I live and practice - not of law) is one of the most religious in the US. Even if a client does NOT believe in God, none of them would be stupid enough to admit that in front of a jury (unless they were directly asked that question).

I can see where you have been going with your questions, statements, and points . . . “this guy must not practice much law because he sure doesn’t talk like a lawyer or cite much law”.

I omit legalese for a reason. Citing the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure or US Supreme Court cases, or even worse - “advisory notes” accompanying a proposed federal rule change - would stop, cold, the vast majority of people reading posts on this forum.

As a fellow attorney, I thought you would have recognized that this is not really a forum to debate who knows the law best or how we should analyze everything from a legal perspective.

And yes, I am familiar with the Geneva/Hague Conventions/Protocols. And although they may not explicitly refer to God as the source of “natural law”, I can assure you that if you went back far enough in history, whether humans thought of God as modern man does or not, I wager you would find very few “atheists” in the sense that they did not believe in anyone or anything more powerful than themselves.

P.S. - the Code of Hammurabi, generally considered the world’s oldest codified system of law, specifically refers to “God”. It was probably not the God I worship - but the codifiers WERE referring to a higher being.

I still submit - Geneva/Hague notwithstanding - that natural law is ultimately rooted in what God “plants” in man’s heart and mind from birth. I don’t subscribe to John Locke’s tabula rasa theory. Although I acknowledge that society plays a huge role in one’s ultimate development, I think that, left to his own devices, a man would know, without being told or taught, that bashing another being’s brains in with a rock simply because he disagreed with the other man over a minor matter, is wrong.

P.S.S. - You said: " I like you Catholics, but I don’t want to live in a state organized around your Church, I’d be found hanging from a lamp post sooner or later."

Well, I would like to live in a state organized around the TEACHINGS of my Church. If I thought the tenets of my faith were not good enough to govern society, I would be a pretty big fool for following it as my faith. And I would NOT advocate hanging you from a light post simply because you disagreed with what I believed.

 

[Salvatore123]

BTW in the post I made before my last, I was NOT referring to WWII - I had in mind something a little closer to home: our own United States Government and its referral to blacks as chattel and counting as 3/5 of a man.

Which country was supposed to come onto sovereign US territory (if the Civil War had not happened) and tell the US that it needed to change it laws on slavery and to what was that country going to rely on in support of its charge against the US?

Good grief - I don’t have to be a lawyer to realize that our own Founding Fathers cited GOD. Just look at part of the Declaration of Independence: “that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

If that is not an example of “natural law”, I don’t know what is . . .

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

Yes, I have tried a few - over a hundred during almost 20 years.

You had me wondering.

You have to understand where I am from and where I practice: my area (where I live and practice - not of law) is one of the most religious in the US. Even if a client does NOT believe in God, none of them would be stupid enough to admit that in front of a jury (unless they were directly asked that question).

Whether a witness takes an oath or affirmation would be unremarkable here. In fact, non-religious affirmations are provided for in the code of civil procedure and warnings against religious prejudice a part of standard jury instructions. Interesting… if I someone raised the religious orientation of a witness, the judge would raise holy hell. Your mileage may vary.

I can see where you have been going with your questions, statements, and points . . . “this guy must not practice much law because he sure doesn’t talk like a lawyer or cite much law”.

I asked if you tried cases. Lots of lawyers are specialists in their own field and never see a courtroom. Personally, I’ll try anything.

I omit legalese for a reason. Citing the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure or US Supreme Court cases, or even worse - “advisory notes” accompanying a proposed federal rule change - would stop, cold, the vast majority of people reading posts on this forum.

I don’t see any legalese here. The advisory notes are usually the plainest statement of what the law is supposed to mean.

As a fellow attorney, I thought you would have recognized that this is not really a forum to debate who knows the law best or how we should analyze everything from a legal perspective.

I’m not seeing any legalese. I thought you weren’t familiar with how the war crimes tribunals then and now are set up. Its more a matter of history and public affairs.

And yes, I am familiar with the Geneva/Hague Conventions/Protocols. And although they may not explicitly refer to God as the source of “natural law”, I can assure you that if you went back far enough in history, whether humans thought of God as modern man does or not, I wager you would find very few “atheists” in the sense that they did not believe in anyone or anything more powerful than themselves.

The international law that came out of the post WW2 trials is not dependent on a belief in God, although freedom of religion is part of those rights. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, from the French Revolution, is an earlier example of a Godless-formulation of the source of rights.

P.S. - the Code of Hammurabi, generally considered the world’s oldest codified system of law, specifically refers to “God”. It was probably not the God I worship - but the codifiers WERE referring to a higher being.

Would the Nazis have walked under that Code?

I still submit - Geneva/Hague notwithstanding - that natural law is ultimately rooted in what God “plants” in man’s heart and mind from birth. I don’t subscribe to John Locke’s tabula rasa theory. Although I acknowledge that society plays a huge role in one’s ultimate development, I think that, left to his own devices, a man would know, without being told or taught, that bashing another being’s brains in with a rock simply because he disagreed with the other man over a minor matter, is wrong.

I think a atheistic natural law proponent would tell you that determining that unlawful killings are wrong is within the capacity of rational human beings and need not necessarily be handed down by God.

P.S.S. - You said: " I like you Catholics, but I don’t want to live in a state organized around your Church, I’d be found hanging from a lamp post sooner or later."

Well, I would like to live in a state organized around the TEACHINGS of my Church. If I thought the tenets of my faith were not good enough to govern society, I would be a pretty big fool for following it as my faith. And I would NOT advocate hanging you from a light post simply because you disagreed with what I believed.

That’s a good start. There’s nothing like a humane government. All the same, I’d rather not have the arbiters of your faith interpreting the commercial code.