The Impact of Necessity upon Justice: A Study in Legal Evolution

FAIN: FB-13226-77

Eileen A. Soldwedel
Edmonds Community College (Lynnwood, WA 98036-5912)

To study the manner in which individual responsibility and the potential conflict between justice and law have been perceived in various historical periods. The Greek conception of Divine Necessity as it pertained to justice in the trial of Jean Baptiste Carrier in 1794, a terrorist whose defense what that he had carried out the directives of the Convention now acting as his judge. This summarizes the problem of individual responsibility in relation to an unjust law.