Contradictions in Roman law left incurable headaches for its judges
I&#x27;d love to discuss with others here something related.<p>I have lately (to my surprise) been drawn by some talks of Antonin Scalia on Youtube.  Far from being repelled (or amused at his standing alone) as I was years ago by his coming down on the opposite side of judgements I thought were socially just and good, I now come to understand better what he was doing. At least if you believe his talks.<p>After listening to his talks (and then thinking back to his opinions), I understand he was trying to make sure that the Constitution was followed to the letter of the law, and that if the people were unhappy with it, let them change it so that it reflected the popular desires.  But let it follow that process.  Not have social or political will creep its way in via individual judges&#x27; or courts&#x27; determination something was now &quot;acceptable enough&quot; that it could be ruled to have evolved and be constitutional at the present time.<p>And that the writers of the Constitution were trying to prevent disaster as much as trying to enable progress -- and that we should be careful when we stray from the words encoding that goal, because when you do that it opens up all sorts of unintended consequences.<p>(Hence the connection to this OP&#x27;s story + comments about law as source code.)<p>This really opened my eyes about what that aspect of judicial conservatism is about.  Not that I agree with all of its philosophy or tendency (in politics) to court a certain sector of the vote, for example.  But it did arouse in me a respect for the guy, to know that for example:<p>If you start relying or putting upon certain institutions (the courts) in society responsibilities or goals to effect the change you want, that may not always be the right thing to do, although it may be the easy &#x2F; politically expedient thing to do at the present time.   Because there may come a day when that power might go opposite to what you wanted (or more importantly, what is right).  And maybe what this country&#x27;s founders set up was consciously a decision to keep things from going off the tracks when too many people thought some rules should simply be imposed by judges because it was the popular thing to do.<p>Other unintended side effects may include: politicization of the judiciary, which we know all too well today.<p>I would encourage anyone curious to listen to some of his talks (especially the Q&amp;A).  Honestly, it really did open my eyes to hear about it.   Maybe I&#x27;m getting more conservative in my old age, but when you&#x27;re a person responsible for others and some process, you start to appreciate this kind of thinking.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=Ggz_gd--UO0" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=Ggz_gd--UO0</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=TRS-jdgHok4" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=TRS-jdgHok4</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=fkChru9L3xA&amp;t=4s" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=fkChru9L3xA&amp;t=4s</a>
(skip all the preface, to his speech at 4min, or skip to the Q&amp;A as the talk is mainly about what the role of morals is in the judiciary&#x2F;government)<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=aXSGDXbc9ZA" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=aXSGDXbc9ZA</a> (very entertaining)<p>And besides all that, what a personality and entertaining figure, and powerhouse of knowledge.  I wish I had appreciated more of this thinking earlier.