Police Must Follow the Law (Most of the Time) There is no easy conclusion regarding the case of Jay Jones. While the national law for post-birth abortion is legal and binding, the law may not be legal under United Nations international treaties and statutes. The police might be liable under international law while they have no liability in the United States. The officer must weight utilitarian concerns with what is best for the greater good, with deontological concerns over absolute moral rights and wrongs that can never be broken. The officer must also decide if the law is so evil that he/she has no choice but to disobey it and accept whatever punishment results from that decision.
General Considerations
The utilitarian premise of the law is that society is better off with being able to allow post-birth abortion. A deontological premise will absolutely forbid the taking of any life for any reason. But does this really matter to the police officer? It should not matter in 99% of the cases the officer is exposed to, but this is about that one percent that can create a crisis in conscience.
A utilitarian argument can be made that police who selectively execute the law are bad for society. There cannot be order if individual officers choose which laws to enforce and which laws to ignore. In the United States, the issue of conscience and gay …show more content…
If I were the officer, I could not do it. I would not allow the law to be broken, however, because establishing a precedent that the law can be selectively disobeyed would result in chaos. I would refuse the order and make my refusal official and in writing. I would not attempt to violently fight the order. I would simply refuse and explain why I was refusing. This personal resistance would follow the actions of Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi. It would be an imperfect action, but a morally correct action against an evil
General Considerations
The utilitarian premise of the law is that society is better off with being able to allow post-birth abortion. A deontological premise will absolutely forbid the taking of any life for any reason. But does this really matter to the police officer? It should not matter in 99% of the cases the officer is exposed to, but this is about that one percent that can create a crisis in conscience.
A utilitarian argument can be made that police who selectively execute the law are bad for society. There cannot be order if individual officers choose which laws to enforce and which laws to ignore. In the United States, the issue of conscience and gay …show more content…
If I were the officer, I could not do it. I would not allow the law to be broken, however, because establishing a precedent that the law can be selectively disobeyed would result in chaos. I would refuse the order and make my refusal official and in writing. I would not attempt to violently fight the order. I would simply refuse and explain why I was refusing. This personal resistance would follow the actions of Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi. It would be an imperfect action, but a morally correct action against an evil