In a recent New York Times article, Stephen Rattner made the rather remarkable argument, when boiled down,  that two pending Federal cases brought by corporations and shareholders affected by the 2008 bailout, intended ostensibly to address the 2008 recession, ought to be decided on the basis of the litigants wealth, not by the normal rule of law standard.  Let’s look at the facts, keeping in mind that there are currently laws that do actually prescribe procedures for dealing with situations involving corporations and their shareholders who have property rights in those companies.

Rattner wants to change the entire approach to the way these legal situations are handled.  So how would that work?  In effect he would want a court to decide who has priority of rights in these situations based on the criteria of wealth.  If you are a “rich” person or corporation and the state muscles you out, tough luck.  The state needs to “use” you for its “higher” purposes.  And after all, you don’t need your money anyway, nor do your shareholders.  Never mind that many of them are average people.

But at any rate, this notion is, as media types are wont to say, disturbing.  Actually it is appalling.  Property rights and a rule of law were not invented just to make some wealthy people happy and keep everyone else in misery.  In fact they weren’t invented by any human, but by God, albeit indirectly by way of assumption.  But even if we assume (like David Hume) that all of this is a legal convention, it has a very beneficial effect—from a utilitarian perspective.  The rule of law means that one knows ahead of time that he or she will be treated according to a known and fixed standard that depends only on the kind of offense they have committed or the kind of right they are asserting, not their race, looks, sex, religion, or even wealth.  That is why it is called a rule of law as opposed to a rule of man.  If it is a rule which applies to all equally, justice is served (assuming it is actually applied properly).  The outcome is not arbitrary, the whim of some individual, in this case, who doesn’t believe wealthy people are deserving of the some protection as others.  Moreover a rule of law places some limit on the state itself.  Otherwise it can simply do what it wishes and make up justifications later, or none at all.  Finally, a rule of law creates incentives for the creativity and productivity of all people.  They can engage in their respective callings without fear that the state will just decide to trample their work or effectively confiscate it.

Mr. Rattner, you are simply wrong, morally, politically, legally and economically.  Christians too should understand that a rule of law is something God Himself demands, as evidenced in His frequent calls for justice to be done and His decrees that no human is above the law.  By the way, you might want to read a very well-done and concise book on the rule of law by Brian Tamanaha, entitled On the Rule of Law:  History, Politics, Theory.  And it never hurts to read the Bible.