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CHILDREN AND JUSTICE
by Douglas Wilson
CHILDREN have an innate
sense of justice that is quite strict. But unless parents shape and mold this
understanding, that sense of justice will do what each sense of justice do when
it goes to seedeither
it will remain strict and manifest itself as egalitarianism, or it will go
the way of all hypocrisy
and remain strict with others and quite loose with itself.
First, egalitarianism. A
child's sense of justice is affronted if any other child within the household
gets any privilege that is significantly different than those held by the other
kids. One bone of contention (and a fine example of this) is bedtime. The fact
that brother is two years older does not mean that he should be allowed to go to
bed an hour later. Hmmm?
Differences in food portions can be included here, as well as travel privileges,
wearing of make-up, and all sorts of other potential pitfalls. Egalitarianism,
as children attempt to impose it, is the doctrine that all children in the
household, except for the baby, should be treated in exactly the same way.
During all such discussions, parents should remember that God created hierarchy
in the world, that egalitarianism is a false and pernicious doctrine, and that a
conflict over such things is a good time to teach this. There is an important
lesson here to learn: rank hath its privileges. This is good and noble and does
not come close to constituting any injustice whatever. So not only should
parents stick to their guns, they should be resolved to not feel guilty.
But there is another sense
in which justice must be even-handed, a sense in which the same principles apply
to all the children. The distinction is one which we used to have in our civil
government, but which has been greatly muddled in recent years. Civil rights,
rightly understood, apply to all. The right to a trial by jury, free speech,
or habeas corpus, should apply to
every citizen whether or not he or she is rich or poor, black or white, tall or
short. But in an example of what has come to be
confused with a civil right is the right
to affordable housing. This is not in the same category.
In the
home, each child does not have the right to the same bedtimein
just the same way that the citizens of the nation do not have the right to the
same annual salary. But every child in the house has the right
to not be convicted of a household crime on the testimony of
just one witness. That
has nothing to do with age, or body weight, or sex, or any other distinction
between the kids.
In the last
judgment, God does not show partiality on the basis of such things as race or
wealth or what have you. This
is the reason why our civil courts should have a statue of Lady Justice outside,
blind-folded. What is it that she is supposed to not see? She is supposed to see
and weigh the evidence, but she is not supposed to see or take into account the
social status of the
accused. Are they poor? Are they rich? It doesn't matter (Ex. 23:3, 6).
In the same
way, and for the same reasons, these basic principles of justice should be
honored in the treatment of the kids. By doing this, parents are not just doing
justice for their kids, but they are also teaching them how to do justice themselves
when they are grown. One of the reasons why many grown-ups do not know how to
handle rules of evidence with any degree of wisdom is that they have not ever
been treated with true justice themselves.
So first,
do not convict any of your children on the strength of one witness alone. For
example, if a squabble pours in from the back yard, and one kid says the other
did something bad, but
that kid denies it, there should not be a spankingeven
if you have a strong hunch that he really did it. Scripture requires that every
fact be established in the mouth of two or three witnesses (2 Cor.13:1). So if
two kids accuse another, but you suspect that they delivered him up because of
envy, then require three witnesses. The Word says two or three, just to mess
with the tidy-minded.
An
exception would be when the one witness is one of the parents. This is not
because the principle is abrogated, but is rather analogous to a defendant
who does something wrong right in the courtroom. The judge has the right to hold
him in contempt of court, and does not have call witnesses to prove to him that
he just heard what he in fact just heard.
Another
basic principle of justice requires that the dispute be of a nature that in principle
it can be inquired into (Deut. 19:18). If one child accuses another one of
harboring sin in his heart, the parent should simply teach, not investigate, and
certainly not spank. But if a child is accused of having climbed up onto the
roof of the garage, then the parent should investigate.
To take the
principle one step further, the accuser must be under authority as well. In that
same passage, a false witness or perjurer, has to be subject to the same penalty
the accused would have received had the charge been found true (Deut. 19:19). To
carry out the example, suppose that getting on the garage roof was a spankable
offense. Suppose a child is accused of it, and it is investigated, and it turns
out that two or three of the other kids saw him up there, and ten minutes later
twenty or thirty neighbor kids saw him up there. So the answer is found, and
Billy gets a spanking. But suppose it is investigated, and the charge turns out
to be false. The child bringing the false charge should be treated as though he
were the one who had climbed up on the roof.
This kind
of approach establishes a home in
justice.
Reprinted from
Credenda/Agenda,
Volume 15,
No.3
Credenda/Agenda
is a religiously and philosophically Trinitarian cultural journal. The magazine
is designed as a tribute to the good life, the life that can only be known in a
world in subjection to the Trinity. Send
a contribution for a hard-copy issue to P.O.Box 8741, Moscow, ID 83843 or link
to their website at www.credenda.org.
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