The Invictus

"Edgar Ray Killen, an 80-year-old former Klansman in a wheelchair, was sentenced Thursday to 60 years in prison for his role in the deaths of three civil rights workers in 1964".

This makes the headlines in today's The New York Times.

For the families of victims that Edgar Ray killed, it's sweet justice. For the Judicial system, it is a proud moment. Everything about this ruling seems to make sense. You kill a man - 3 men in this case - you pay for it. Simple. Or is it?

I welcome this ruling completely. I subscribe to the idea that the law of the land MUST be upheld - each time and every time, unfailingly & unflinchingly. But something about this case also sets me thinking - can we apply the above idiom of justice in each case, ie. go by the rule book consistently forever? Do we acknowledge the fact that the rule book itself - or its interpretation by the Jury system of justice - can change over time? Consider the below extract from the article,

"Prosecutors said that a sheriff's deputy pulled over the three men on June 21, 1964, and jailed them long enough for Mr. Killen to organize a death trap. Jurors said they rejected murder charges because the evidence, much of it transcripts of testimony from a 1967 federal trial, did not prove that Mr. Killen knew that the men would be killed.

In 1967 the federal government tried 18 men for conspiring to deprive the victims of their civil rights. Seven were convicted; none served more than six years in prison. That jury deadlocked 11 to one in favor of convicting Mr. Killen; the holdout said she could not convict a preacher. The state had not brought charges in the deaths until Mr. Killen was prosecuted this year".


This crime was committed in 1964 - 41 years ago. You will note that the '60s in America was a time when public opinion was divided between "For Civil rights / liberty" and "For discrimination against african americans"..Crimes such as the one described above were not isolated instances, but were related to a larger trend (am NOT justifying the trend, neither am i saying it was right). Times have changed in these 41 years. If such an incident were to occur today, it would certainly make more noise and shock more people than when it did 41 years ago. What this means is that the public - and the Jury that is, but, a subset of the larger public - reaction to such crimes would certainly be different in 2005 than what it was in 1964. Values can change; Ideas of "right" and "wrong" can change in 41 years. Can you apply today's values to yesteryear's crimes? Here's an example from the above extract itself: The Jury of 1967 trial didn't convict this man, whereas today's Jury did! This despite the fact that in 1967, the jury had access to more evidence and witnesses than what today's jury did! And there have NOT been any new evidence that has come up in these 41 years that gave the current jury fresh ammunition to go by, that the earlier jury didn't have. It appears that it's a case of changing societal values that came into play in influencing the current jury decision.

This begs the question: Can we reopen old cases and try them against today's sense of morality and ethos? Pardon my exaggeration, but allow me to illustrate this conundrum. In the 1930's - '40s, as part of the Indian freedom struggle, several Indian freedom fighters went on strike against the government of the day (British) refusing to co-operate (Non co-operation movement). We hail them as great heroes (deservedly so). But such acts are considered to be evil, non-progressive and subversive activities today. So do we repaint the acts of freedom movement against today's canvas? Sounds silly, I agree. But isn't that what has happened in the above case?

Each act - good or bad - needs to be evaluated against the ethos and values of that day and age, taking into consideration the prevailing circumstances that make for the order of the day; Shifting lenses of time to view earlier acts is dangerous and neverending.