Social Justice

Mr. Herringsworth walked briskly into the drab concrete room in which his client, Eric Brooks, was already seated. A quick glance showed him that aside from his client, the dingy holding room contained only a small concrete table and two rickety plastic chairs. The policeman who escorted the lawyer into the room stepped outside and shut the door behind him.

The primly-dressed lawyer saw that his client had taken a seat in one of the chairs at the table and was holding his head despondently. Mr. Herringsworth calmly sat down opposite him and placed his leather briefcase on the table.

“You’ve got to help me, Bob!” his client said as soon as Mr. Herringsworth had taken a seat. “They’re threatening me with jail time – jail time! And me, as innocent as a lamb.”

“Of course,” the lawyer replied, as he opened his briefcase and rummaged through it. “All you did was – let’s see – ah, here is your file. You broke into a house, stole $15,000 worth of equipment, burned the house down, ran over three police officers trying to escape, and caused a five-car traffic accident. Whatever possessed you to break into the home of a police officer, Eric? Couldn’t you have at least waited until they left the premises?”

“I didn’t know they were still home,” Eric said. “I was drunk at the time. You can put that in my case – temporary insanity. They’ll let me off for that.”

Mr. Herringsworth shook his head. “Just what were you trying to steal, anyway? Based on the list the police gave me it looks like mostly electronics equipment.”

“I was just trying to even things out a bit,” Eric replied. “They had all kinds of expensive toys – insured, too, I bet. I just wanted a piece of it, that’s all. I’m sure that their insurance will pay them back. There was no harm done.”

His lawyer shook his head. “Your method is insane. Whatever convinced you that burglary was the right approach? If Officer Connors had preloaded his shotgun before you broke into his house we wouldn’t even be having this conversation. Your organs would have become a permanent part of his living room décor.”

Eric winced at the thought. “You’ve got to do something about that, by the way. See if you can prosecute him for breaking gun-control laws. Guns are dangerous – someone might get hurt! It’s just not safe out there for a burglar anymore.”

“I’m sure that the courts are very interested in taking guns away from police officers,” his lawyer replied. “That’s going to go over exceptionally well.”

Eric glared at him. “Fine, then. What would you have done, Mr. Moneybags?”

The lawyer leaned back in his chair and looked at him. “If you really want to have someone else pay for your big-screen TV then you need to approach the situation from the angle of social justice.”

“Social what?”

“Social justice! The fact that you have less than your neighbors is unjust, Eric – you’ve been wronged! Society has let you down and you’ve become a victim of circumstance. You need to talk to a few reporters and tell them how you are just trying to earn a meager living while the high-rollers down the street are living it up with huge TVs. Tell them that it’s not far that they have things that you don’t. Get the reporters to write stories on the huge gap between the rich and the poor, and the great unfairness of it all.

“With a little effort you could get a nationwide campaign going and form some special interest groups! The groups could then pressure politicians to increase taxes on the wealthy and give that tax increase to you – in the interest of fairness, of course. You can then use that tax increase to get the things that you could never have afforded before.”

“That seems like a lot of work,” Eric said.

“But think of the benefits! If you had done it that way then you would have had the police power of the state behind you. If Officer Connors had refused to pay his taxes in order to fund your new TV the government would actually go into his house, arrest him, and take away everything he owned. Not only would you have your TV but the police would actually arrest anyone who tried to stop you from getting it.”

“Hmmm,” the burglar replied thoughtfully. “So instead of being behind bars – ”

“You would be at home right now, watching a TV paid for with someone else’s money.”

“Beautiful,” Eric said. “This opens up whole new horizons! My car payments, medicines, insurance – ”

“You got it,” his lawyer replied. “You would have had everything paid for.”

“Wow. That’s amazing! You mean to tell me that method actually works?”

“Think about it,” Mr. Herringsworth replied.