Law/Criminology Essay

Law/Criminology Essay

Introduction

Law is a sequence of boundaries and rules that are made by higher authorities. These laws ought to be obeyed or else the sanction will be given to the law offender. According to Sir John Salmond, laws are the principle bodies applied by the state for maintaining justice. On the other hand, Morals are the values, beliefs, and principles that are made by society and they are the evaluator that what is correct or incorrect. Morals are unlike the legal compliance or rules, but it is a voluntary notion that informally forced by domestic or social pressure. This paper intends to cover different sides of laws and morals and how currently they are being implemented in different cases of United Kingdom. Moreover, it will also differentiate the public and private laws; the role and function of civil law; and the role and function of criminal law.

Discussion

Morals and laws both contain normative nature. They simply specify the boundaries between non acceptable and acceptable course of actions. However, the ways of implementation of both are different, because laws are the mandatory codes to which society has to obey. Importantly, these laws are officially enforced by the constituted authorities like Police, Judges, and other law makers. Usually, laws can be found in seeking to guard our moral values. On the other hand, this could be found as a problematic concern under the nature of moral code.

Research shows that morals change by the time in the shape of changing attitudes, but law has to be in the similar firm position. This changing attitude can be understood from the example of R v R (1991). In this case, it was seen that the wife is being considered as a legal property of the husband, and he has a right to even rape a wife. The relationship of husband and wife is not only a legal formality but humanity and respect also exists in this relationship. This attitude towards wife was morally wrong, but the law took much time in adopting this moral view.

The actions like murder and robbery are considered wrong as both legally and morally. But crimes like parking violations are not considered as immoral, while acts like adultery will be regarded as immoral actions, but not considered as criminal offence under the law of United Kingdom. This is certainly a controversial state where one action is immoral, but not legally justified.

Laws are mandatory enforcement through the system of court. Morality and law can be found in different states and thus their relationship is quite diverse. However, they both are intertwined, but hold different values. There are certain theories that define the association of morals and laws. The primary theory is natural law that was adopted by St Thomas Aquinas. This theory describes that one should disregard the law if it is not suitable with natural code, or unless it would lead to the social turmoil. This theory has many problems with its higher code as it seems to ...