With Liberty and Justice for a Few

This essay does not necessarily contradict Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rev. Theodore Parker on whether the arc of the moral universe bends at all, much less which way. But growing and glaring injustices require ethicists to interrogate the powerful, aspirational phrase. For instance, children learn the Pledge of Allegiance early: “with liberty and justice for all.” They expect that everyone will be treated fairly in a democracy. Depending on their race, sex, gender, class, ability, location, etc., many realize, some very early and violently, that these words ring hollow for all but a few. Whether and how justice-seeking functions as “an effective strategic goal for a society in chaos” is not certain. While I am by nature an optimist, this essay reckons with the hideous, immoral conduct by powerful people, which leaves me with serious reservations and yet seeking hope

Allegiance · Appeal · Economic Justice · Moral responsibility · Pledge · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Pragmatism in Philosophy and Education