NOBODY Expects...

If someone, client or not, approaches me and gives me information in confidence - that is to say, on the strict understanding that I shall not divulge it to another without my informant's permission - then I will consider myself bound in conscience not to divulge it. The nature of the information is not relevant to my obligation, once I have accepted the information on that basis of confidentiality. (Naturally, one should not rashly or casually enter into such a situation).

If a law should be passed providing that the State shall be entitled to demand of me that I break the confidence, I will prefer to break that law than to betray my informant's trust.

Martin Luther is not really a hero of mine, but he did have his moments. I adopt his wonderful statement

Unless I am convinced by ... plain and clear reasons and arguments, I can and will not retract, for it is neither safe nor wise to do anything against conscience. Here I stand. I can do no other."

Henry David Thoreau expressed it thus

If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.

Is This Not Immoral ?

There are those who say that what I am expressing above is an immoral stance. The only justifications so far advanced (to my knowledge) for that view are

1. "A citizen is morally obliged to obey the law"

   There is an implication that that obligation is subject to no qualification, reservation or exceptions, and is, therefore, unlimited. In turn, this seems to amount to saying that the civil law is always identical with morality.

   Can this really be the case ? What about the position of the defendants at Nuremberg - most of whom claimed that their misdeeds were entirely legal under German law of the time- then ? Were their punishments wrong ?

2. "The ends justify the means"

   Not many realise that this formulation was apparently much used by Torquemada, the villain of The Spanish Inquisition, and that it was precisely this formulation that was repudiated very quickly by the Vatican authorities of the time, and which for centuries was regarded by all educated people as the very epitome of immorality. It is still so regarded by me.

Many readers will protest that the context of this discussion is everything, that context being the need to address the problem of the sexual abuse of children, and the failure to reveal it for so long.

Context cannot be unimportant, but is it ever all-important ? I say not. Furthermore, it will be seen that references of this kind to "context" are but another way of saying that the end justifies the means.

Do I think that there are NO circumstances in which I would break a confidence ? "Never say never" is a good rule. Indeed, to say "never" is to bind one's future conscience with the decision of an earlier consideration, which may have been imperfect for one reason or another.

However, I refuse to delegate the exercise of my conscience to the legislature, and still less to "public opinion", any more than I am willing to delegate it to the Pope.

Note that I make these remarks not in my capacity as a lawyer, but as a human being.

If I Cannot Call Them "Whited Sepulchres"....

I read "The Irish Independent" as seldom as possible but David Quinn spoke for me yesterday. Addressing one of the fits of righteous indignation into which the majority of the Irish commentariat has driven itself of late, he observed

[E]ven allowing for the caricature that Old Testament morality is all about judgment and condemnation, what could possibly be more judgmental and condemnatory, more 'Old Testament', than the avalanche of criticism currently pouring down... ?

He goes on to bring up the "H" word again, and while he uses one of less helpful meanings identified by me the other day , the point that he makes is an excellent one:

In fact, the liberal hatred of hypocrisy is extremely dangerous because there are only two ways to avoid hypocrisy. The first is to live perfectly, while the second is to preach nothing. But none of us is perfect, and therefore the only sure way to avoid the charge of hypocrisy is option two, to preach nothing and abandon practically all standards.

(If his intention is to say that only "liberals" - whatever meaning that term has in the Irish context - hate hypocrisy, though, I do not agree with him.)

As I said recently, I have pulled back from using the term "whited sepulchre" to describe the commentators who surrender themselves so glibly to extreme schadenfreude, but I would love to to find a replacement, as I expect to need it again before long.

Terry Eagleton's Divine Devilry

Even when I am disagreeing with him, or struggling with his ideas,Terry Eagleton rarely fails to make me laugh.

He has done it most recently in a review in The London Review of Books. The book is "Accident: A Philosophical and Literary History" by Ross Hamilton , and in introducing the topic, Eagleton remarks that

Since [God's] freedom means that... there is no necessity about him, other than the necessity to be true to his divine nature, it follows that he did not need to create the world at all. He did it just for the hell of it.

He goes on

There was nothing in it for him. He could simply have remained indolently, luxuriously himself for all eternity. He might also have saved himself an unbelievable amount of trouble.

And

In this sense, the universe is an accident. This does not mean that God created it by mistake or in a fit of absent-mindedness. It means simply that like falling house prices or the invasion of Iraq, there is no necessity to it.

Unfortunately, this review is not available to non-subscribers.

More on Marriage

I wrote here on the subject of marriage just before Christmas. To me, most of what was interesting in that posting was referrable to some American websites. The sites describe themselves as being of an economics bent, which is not inaccurate, but it is important to know that, in general, they share a devotion to libertarianism. This is a common, but not universal, affliction of economists. Fortunately, it is not inconsistent with insightful writing and stimulating discusssion.

Now, from another libertarian site, I offer you another provocative article on the subject.

I was referred to the article myself by yet another libertarian, Arnold Kling, whose eye was caught by this passage in particular:

...Hedonic marriage is different from productive marriage. In a world of specialization, the old adage was that “opposites attract,” and it made sense for husband and wife to have different interests in different spheres of life. Today, it is more important that we share similar values, enjoy similar activities, and find each other intellectually stimulating. Hedonic marriage leads people to be more likely to marry someone of their similar age, educational background, and even occupation. As likes are increasingly marrying likes, it isn’t surprising that we see increasing political pressure to expand marriage to same-sex couples.

In general, we are still in an age of specialisation, but the trend inside relationships has, for some decades now, been in the other direction. Men are expected to take their turns feeding babies in the middle of the night, for example.

One may agree or disagree with this and the other views set out - my own views are not set in stone - but I say that this is useful material for rumination.

Let's Have More Inequality !

(Placatory note to my left-wing comrades: think multicultural, OK ?)

As he licks his wounds after losing his political career, Michael McDowell gets support for his position on inequalityfrom economist Arnold Kling.

A couple of months ago, I drew attention to another article by Kling. Like the earlier one, this article is yet another contribution to the debate on immigration which has continued even after the recent defeat of the proposed amendments to U.S. immigration legislation.

Quoth he:

Giovanni Peri writes [that]U.S.-born workers are climbing the educational ladder, acquiring interactive/analytic skills and progressively leaving the manual jobs that would put them in competition with immigrants. If the trend continues as expected, the day is not far off when virtually all manual labor will be performed by foreign-born labor. This implies large wage gains for native workers, since they will be able to specialize in language-intensive and interactive tasks that are typically far better paid.

While some people shudder at the prospect of a more stratified society with immigrants at the bottom, keep in mind that the biggest gainers by far in this situation are the immigrants themselves. They can expect to earn six to seven times what they can now make in similar jobs in their countries of origin.

So it's a win-win. We get more nannies, lawn-care workers, waiters, and hotel maids, the immigrants get more money, and our kids learn skills that keep them out of competition with the underclass. All we have to lose is our self-concept of an egalitarian society.

I can see why economists have difficulty selling our pro-immigration position.

It seems to me that this reasoning is equally applicable to the Irish position.

Incidentally, I see that Sam Brittan, for whose views I have enormous respect, "has a go" at crude equality crusaders in a recent article.