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Comment by inflatableDodo | Hacker News Reader

>"Say a soldier who committed war crimes and, after serving his sentence, refuses to testify against their partners. Would you still grant them a right to refusal on these grounds?"

Other than asking them, there is no moral way to compel someone to testify if they do not want to speak. Jailing them repeatedly one question at a time is clearly abusive.

edit - this isn't difficult ethically. Unless you construct some imminent scenario (puppy trapped down well, etc.), you are locking someone up purely to know more. They aren't themselves depriving you directly of anything other than their perspective on events.

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Subpoena are considered moral, I think, because testimony is required for democratic society so that we don’t rely on hearsay. There are many situations where someone does not “want” to testify, but it is necessary to better understand the truth.

If someone could just decline subpoenas then we would lost rule of law.

I think it’s worth pointing out that there are checks on judges issuing subpoenas and it’s not done arbitrarily.

Sorry I have to ask, what are the checks on judges? What if you change judge every time?

> what are the checks on judges?

Other judges. This is why appeals and petitions to higher courts exist.

Worse problem for democracy is refusal of prosecutors to prosecute public officials even in cases of obvious miscarriage of their duties to the public (or lets say highly controversial acts with high casualty counts and largescale damage on property of other people - like going to arrest 4 people for parole violation and contempt of court,... and burning down the entire neighbourhood and killing 11 people).

One egregious example is (today is the aniversary) 1985 bombing of MOVE:

http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,141842,...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE

What are the checks on refusal to prosecute? Are there even any? One might find it more apppealing to cooperate with a justice system that at least tries to do its job wrt people who police the public.

All of the lawyers I've spoken to (liberal, conservative, and other) seem to feel that it's a necessary evil to avoid exposing every public official to constant harassment on every decision. That is, it's not perfect, and bad things do happen, but rarely, and the alternatives to fix those rare cases are worse.

I'm not entirely sure I buy that. It does sound an awful lot like collective ass-covering. But I do try to take into account that prominent, widely-noted failures do not necessarily invalidate a system that functions reasonably well most days.

There is both a hierarchy of courts and judges are appointed or elected on different schedules and methods to help prevent a single mindset, age, philosophy, and capability.

There’s also public records of petitions brought up against motions. So if I disagree with an injunction, I have legal recourse in the court above the one issuing an order.

" There are many situations where someone does not “want” to testify, but it is necessary to better understand the truth."

In my opinion, such a belief is extremely dangerous for a society, even if I suppose that it is shared by most US citizens, who grew up believing that they live in a "free" country, where they should trust justice.

Many years ago, USA advertised itself to the world as a champion of "human rights".

In my opinion, the most important "human right" is to be free to refuse to answer to any question, in any context, including during a testimony.

I do not know if there exists at least a country where this right is recognized, but this just prove how abusive are most state constitutions and laws.

Unlike most of you, I know very well the importance of this right, because I was born and raised in a country which was governed by a gang of thieves and murderers, who were installed in power by the Russian invaders.

Where the thieves make the laws and where the main purpose of the "law enforcement" is to prevent any attempt of resistance against the government and their servants, who share the spoils, do you believe that it is right if anyone who refuses to testify can be severely punished ?

About testimony being required in a "democratic society", unfortunately nothing guarantees that a society that is democratic now will remain democratic tomorrow.

After 1990, it seemed that democracy will improve in most of the world, but it did not happen so. While im many formerly communist countries there were modest improvements, during the last 30 years the western countries and especially USA have become each year more and more like the communist countries from before 1990.

This has happened not only in the many new abusive laws and in the more and more incompetent governments, but also in the economy, where every year brings more major merges & acquisitions, increasing the power of monopolies.

There was a single important difference between the "socialist" economies and the "capitalist" economies. In the socialist economies there were only monopolies. Everyone can see the results.

Note, that it’s true that one can’t be compelled to testify. And the consequence is being put in prison temporarily.

I don’t see how market system (socialism v capitalism) matters in this sense because rule of law is essential for democratic society.

US Courts have always had the power to compel testimony via subpoena. It is in fact the only way a US court can compel testimony from a witness.

Considered moral by who? Those who subpoena people?

Our first amendment guarantees a right to speak. It also grants the right to not speak. You're saying its acceptable to deprive someone if that right because you want their information.

You're arguing against every law on the matter in any number of countries generally considered democratic, so I do believe that it isn't quite as easy, ethically, as you assert.

>Jailing them repeatedly one question at a time is clearly abusive.

I believe this statement is where they tried to delineate between "a number of countries" and this instance but I'm not the OC, so I can't speak for them; however, that's the way that I'm reading it.

I possibly put it badly. I have no problem with courts questioning people or even the detainment for questioning (as long as it does not become a pattern of harrassment). What I am against is ongoing detention outside of what is neccesary for the purposes of attempting to ask someone questions. If they do not speak, then you have to keep asking, but you cannot ask all the time. Locking someone up, especially in solitary as it appears they have done in this case, as a punishment for not speaking, is pretty barbaric.

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