MOses, Achilles' Shield and the Supreme Court

Previously we referenced the Ten Commandments as a scenic milepost in the history of property rights. Moses and the Ten Commandments are depicted several times in the art of the Supreme Court Building itself. This website has several pictures and some commentary making much of this fact. The photographs are great, I wouldn't make overmuch of the commentary. As this website with an opposing view points out, Confucious, Salon, Mohammad, Draco, and Napoleon are also depicted on the Supreme Court building. I suspect they undervalue the significance of the Moses depictions in a few areas, just as the first website overplays that significance.
Nonetheless, Moses and the Ten Commandments are located in several places in the Supreme Court, as well as other D.C. institutions (like our favorite, the Library of Congress).

I have briefly touched on one other scenic milepost- the shield of Achilles as depicted by Homer in the Iliad. That may seem like an odd choice, but please stay with us while I explain why I believe that has some connection with our little tour through the history of jurisprudence and property rights.
Jurisprudence itself is, in a way, a history of property rights, because if we have no right to our own lives and property, there's very little need for jurisprudence.

But let's look at the trial scene from Achilles' shield. Two men have a dispute over the blood-gelt or blood-money which one is supposed to pay for to the other, one presumes for the death of a family member at the hands of the first. They take their dispute to the elders of the city. Their litigation is attended by many witnesses. The elders of the city will listen to the two men, and then, one by one, they will announce their judgment. Once they have done that, the people will pronounce their own judgment on the judges.

There are two "two talents laid down, to be given to him whose judgment should be deemed the fairest."
Unlike our own Supreme Court justices, these judges are not isolated from the consequences of their judgment.

What does this have to do with our Supreme Court? As a legal precedent, not much, if anything. As a point of interest, this scene is portrayed on the bronze doors of the main entrance of the Supreme Court Building. The Donnely family, who sculpted the doors, described this scene as 'the most famous representation of primitive law.' Methinks we might be better off with some 'primitive' law, rather than this 'progressive' or rather digressive Supreme Court.

Postscript: The Supreme Court ruled today that, as Michelle Malkin puts it, the Ten Commandments may be displayed 'on but not in' the building. The Rovian Conspiracy wonders about sandblasting.

And POwerline says:

In the Ten Commandments cases, the Court upheld an order striking down a display of the religious document on the wall of courthouses in two Kentucky counties. But it found no constitutional violation in the placement of a Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the state capitol building in Austin, Texas.

One suspects absurd hair-splitting, but that judgment must await a reading of the (many) opinions.

The doublemindedness is amusing, but the Kelo case will have far more immediate implications for all of us. Moses depicted on or in a building is a symbol. Granting the right to seize private property from one owner and give it to another is substantive theft.





Previous Property Rights related posts:
back in March, I first mentioned the Kelo case.
Here's the post where I announced the ruling
Here's a longer follow up with a property rights lesson learned in my childhood days
Here's a longer follow up with plenty of links and commentary