Polilaws—a Deadly Species

Please bear with me, Dear Reader; the preamble has relevance. You have probably never heard of John Jay Chapman. He was born in New York on 2nd March, 1862. His father became president of the New York Stock Exchange. His grandmother was one of the leading campaigners against slavery. John Jay attended the Harvard Law School. In 1887 he assaulted a man for insulting his girlfriend, but subsequently punished himself for this act by putting his left hand into a fire. The hand was so badly burnt he had to have it amputated. Chapman argued that politicians tended to be influenced by the power of big business. Faced with the choice between “lucrative malpractice and thankless honesty,” he claimed they usually opted for corruption. He died on 4th November, 1933.
Unfortunately, many lawyers are not in the slightest interested in innocence or guilt. All they appear to be concerned with is whether or not they can find a loophole through which the accused can creep to avoid being found guilty of the charges or allegations. They take on cases where the accused has been caught red-handed and then rake in the profits when they succeed in persuading lesser intellects that a legal technicality is more valuable than reality; to my mind this is “lucrative malpractice” and the profits can be material, financial or political.
In his address to the Normal Manley Law School of 2002, Kenny Anthony cited John Jay Chapman’s comment that “the world of politics is always twenty years behind the world of thought.” Kenny decided that Chapman had got it wrong. As Kenny said, hands-on experience had taught him that politicians were “way ahead of the legal and judicial intelligentsia.”
Now isn’t that interesting. Kenny thinks that politicians, and himself in particular – but not UWP politicians obviously – are much more intelligent, better qualified to interpret the law, and possess many other qualities that make them “way ahead” of lawyers and judges. Obviously, being one of the Chosen Few that are more capable than the rest of us, and being both a lawyer and a politician, he runs the risk of “getting way ahead of himself” on occasion, which might explain, but not excuse, the colossal blunders he makes, both as a lawyer and a politician.
The world is a funny, but scary, place. New species develop over time; the hermaphroditic Polilaw is just one recent example that threatens to ruin society. A hermaphrodite, by the way, may be defined as a plant or animal having both male and female reproductive organs and secondary sexual characteristics, somebody who has both male and female elements of genital structure and both male and female secondary sexual characteristics, or somebody or something that combines two very different elements or qualities, or seems to belong to two different classifications. Another name for hermaphrodite is androgyne, thus a hermaphrodite may be described as androgynous.
But enough of that; an androgynous Polilaw, the result of hermaphroditic coupling by a Politician-cum-Lawyer, is dangerous because it possesses, once in office, the power to dictate through legislation, the omnipotent arrogance of knowing what is best, and the slippery security of being the anointed one, ointment and all.
Lawyers, as most of us realize, are funny little creatures; when you seek representation they invariably spend valuable, billable time forever seeking advice, second opinions and counsel. But once they have given themselves a good hermaphroditic “rogering” and the transformation process from Human to Polilaw is completed, they become omnipotent, all knowing, and in need of no counsel or advice.
They alone hold the key to the correct interpretation of the Law; they possess the power to intimidate perceived underlings through their position and authority. They can interpret the Law as they see fit and even enact new laws or have constitutions changed, which is pretty scary. The Polilaw, as Kenny hinted, is “way ahead of the legal and judicial” system. Kenny, apparently and to judge by his behaviour, sees himself to be what others might consider the Supreme Polilaw, and that is really scary!
Why scary? Well, in a group of regular folks, like the Cabinet of Ministers, for example, if there were only one doctor the rest of them would defer to his diagnosis of a medical problem; if there were only one engineer, her views on the construction of a bridge would prevail; and if there were only one Polilaw, then his interpretation of the law would be final, possibly to the detriment of the whole country. Polilaw Power means that any pronouncement made becomes the truth. Polilaw Power guarantees validity and brooks no argument, which is why the Constitution should exclude any Polilaw from meddling in such bodies as the Public Service Commission.
Let us digress for a moment and consider where would be the best place to find breakers of the law of all shapes and sizes. Where else but Bordelais? Sadly, correctional officers have a poor record of behaviour at the correctional facility. In many cases they have been caught red-handed trying to import “contraband” into the prison.
Contraband can mean anything from prohibited articles such as cell phones and drugs to potentially lethal weapons. In other cases officers have been accused of a dereliction of duty that resulted in the escape of dangerous inmates. Presently, there are approximately 30 such cases of misbehavior by officers before the Public Service Commission. Sometimes they have legal representation; believe it or not, it has not been unknown for a Polilaw in Power, yes a member of government, to intervene in a case before the Commission and influence its decision.
Let me give you an example: Some time ago during the SLP administration, an officer was accused of misbehaviour concerning a cell phone and a prisoner. I won’t go into details, but there seemed to be no argument about the facts of the case. The challenge for his “representative” was to find a loophole!
The Public Service Commission was of the opinion that the allegations as reported indicated that a criminal offense had been committed and that it should be dealt with as a criminal matter. The Polilaw in Power, that is the member of the SLP government who spoke on behalf of the officer, tried to convince the Commission otherwise. For the record: the cell phone was referred to as the “instrument” and a “communication device”, possibly to make it sound more innocent. This is how the argument, paraphrased and simplified, reportedly went:
The possession and carrying of a cell phone is not illegal in normal circumstances. Therefore the introduction of a cell
phone into the Correctional Facility is in itself not an illegal act. It does, however, contravene local prison regulations and could be seen as a breach of Staff Orders, which is not a criminal offence, nor is it grounds for dismissal. The misbehavior should be dealt with administratively not as a criminal matter, and the officer returned to duty.
The Public Service Commission apparently did not buy this argument and stood by its original interpretation and declared it was unable to handle the matter administratively. Both the Ministry of Public
Service and the Director of Bordelais however refer in their correspondence to the fact that this named high SLP government official advised and instructed the Commission to deal with the allegations administratively—which the Commission was unable to do.
The Ministry of Public Service, obviously more amenable to the arguments of the domineering high SLP government official, ruled that the matter be dropped. The officer returned to duty after years of suspension with full pay and without a stain on his record.
I think everyone would agree that if a Polilaw in power, very high up in government, were to advise or instruct the Public Service Commission on how to treat such a case, such interference would constitute a horrendous abuse of power by a member of government. How could such a member of government ever pretend to be a champion of law and order?
Of course, if the Polilaw believes that, as Kenny himself put it, politicians are “way ahead of the legal and judicial intelligentsia” then it is quite understandable that such a politician-cum-lawyer would see himself as above the Law and more capable of interpreting the word of the law to suit his own purposes, or those of his client.
This wild interpretation of the Law as reportedly put to the Commission would put the whole country in danger if it became generally acceptable. Let me explain: By accepting this spurious argument, the relevant authorities condone the importation of all prohibited items that are not in themselves illegal.
The possession and carrying of a toothbrush is not illegal but it can be made into a deadly stiletto by simply scraping the handle against a rough cell wall and your throat
would be slit in an instant. The possession and carrying of a kitchen knife is not illegal, but the importation of such an implement could have deadly consequences and someone would end up in slices. The possession and carrying of a licensed firearm by a person licensed to carry such a firearm is equally legal but if it found its way into the hands of an inmate it could cause death and mayhem.
The regulations concerning the importation of prohibited items into Bordelais are there for a good reason: to protect society. If the reported incident of meddling is true, the successful attempt by this unnamed SLP Polilaw to thwart the normal proceedings of the Public service Commission constituted an abuse of power that has created a potentially dangerous precedent that would allow “legal” contraband to be smuggled into prison with impunity.
Presently, over 30 of 180 correctional officers, one in every six,have cases before the Public Service Commission. Of these 30 cases, Dr Kenny Anthony is acting for 6 of them, one in every 5, which is a novel way of fighting crime.