Truth is a Complete Defense

This is a legal concept to defend against a libel and slander case against a public person (private individuals can counteract the truthness defense by claiming invasion of privacy, but I digress).

I love throwing that comment out, because it seems so logical and every person can relate to that being a defense. Tonight, Leon gave a speech at toastmasters about an illogical legal concept. Actual innocence is NOT grounds for a new trial or a viable legal concept to allow someone a repreive from the death penalty through the courts. WT you know what??? Scalia stated that actual innocence does not give a convicted criminal a constitutional right not to be put to death. Apparently that's just the price of living in this country and benefiting from the constitutional freedoms and due process afforded to us. (sarcasm font needed).

A new case has partially overturned this concept, but the problem is that the case doesn't follow precedent and it only goes so far. The only way to reopen a case when new evidence tends to show the innocence of the defendant is if that evidence could not have been found at the time of the original trial. They really had to reach to allow a retrial in this new case, because the "new evidence" is that the witnesses recanted their testimony (every one of them, but I digress). "Could not have been found at trial" seems like a really difficult bar to reach and only suspending reality allows the legal system to come to the correct result. Bad cases make bad law (another great pithy legal saying). [OM you know who, does that mean I agree with Scalia? Perish the thought.]

Too bad Truth is a Complete Defense doesn't translate to other areas of the law. Too bad too many in government historically have viewed the constitution as a law limiting our rights to those enumerated (not withstanding the often overlooked 9th Amendment, but I digress) and not as a restraint on law. The first amendment starts with "Congress shall make no law..." The constitution is not the highest law in the land. It is a limit on the government's right to make laws and control the citizens empowering the government. All government officials take an oath to uphold the constitution (some taking it more seriously than others, but I digress). To me, it should be that they take an oath to accept the limits on their powers as set forth in the Constitution. Just because the constitution doesn't give an innocent person the right NOT TO BE UNJUSTLY CONVICTED AND PUT TO DEATH, really doesn't mean that it is ok. Sometimes the law needs a reality check.

Shout out to Leon--don't you just love Law. [When I first went to law school, I was intimidated by the really big books with very small print. Now it's like a book you never want to end--the bigger the book and the smaller the print, the better, but I digress.]