Ancient Chinese Legalists, like Han Fei Tzu, had a dim view of human nature.  They believed that we are all selfish and venal and that the only way of attaining  order and stability in society is through extensive legal regulation of everyday life and, most importantly, harsh punishments applied with no exceptions.

     Those sorts of principles are consistent with the approach to juvenile justice described in this story: "Lifers as Teenagers, Now Seeking Second Chance."   It outlines a peculiarly American-Legalist attitude:

In December, the United Nations
took up a resolution calling for the abolition of life imprisonment
without the possibility of parole for children and young teenagers. The
vote was 185 to 1, with the United States the lone dissenter.

Indeed, the United States stands alone in the world in convicting young
adolescents as adults and sentencing them to live out their lives in
prison. According to a new report, there are 73 Americans serving such
sentences for crimes they committed at 13 or 14.

     What should we do when children – and let’s define "children" here as under 18 – commit horrible, violent crimes?  Some sort of confinement and punishment is justifiable.  But our approach to the problem is shaped by our assumptions about what human beings are capable of by way of rehabilitation.  Confucians would agree with US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote an opinion stating that persons should not be executed for crimes committed when they were  children (younger than 18):

He [Kennedy] added that teenagers were different from older criminals — less
mature, more susceptible to peer pressure and more likely to change for
the better. Those findings, lawyers for the juvenile lifers say, should
apply to their clients, too.

“Thirteen- and 14-year-old children
should not be condemned to death in prison because there is always hope
for a child,” said Bryan Stevenson, the executive director of the Equal
Justice Initiative, which represents Ms. Jones and several other
juvenile lifers.

     Children are not adults.  They have yet to achieve moral maturity and, thus, do not have a full understanding of the ramifications of their actions.  They may commit horrible acts but such behavior should be taken – Confucians would argue – as expressions of their immaturity, not their full adult responsibility for their own actions.  Children must be taught how to develop their innate human goodness; they must learn how to be humane.  If they kill or act violently, simple punishment and retribution will not promote their moral education.  Throwing them in jail for life with adult offenders only kills their potential Humanity.

     But those Confucian assumptions are not the basis of the US legal system.  Instead we get statements like this:

“Between the ages of 2 and 3, you develop a conscience,” Ms. Poston
[the prosecutor] said. “She [the perpetrator] never got the voice that says, ‘This is bad, Ashley.’ ”

    This is absurd, suggesting that by 3 years of age a child will have a fully developed adult moral conscience.  I cannot imagine that any serious theory of child development would agree with this.  It is, rather, simply a reflection of deeply held Legalist biases:  If a person is not morally responsible by 3, he or she never will be and, therefore, must be constrained by strict laws and harsh punishments.  It is not far from that idea to this one:

In a strict household there are no unruly slaves, but the children of a kindly mother often turn out bad. (Han Fei Tzu,125)

     If we are "kind," if we believe that children can learn from even horrific mistakes and that human rehabilitation is possible, then the children will run wild.  That pretty much sums up juvenile justice in the US.  And we certainly do not want to take into account (as Confucians would do) any mitigating circumstances that might have contributed to a teenagers moral failings:

In a telephone interview from the Tutwiler Prison for Women in
Wetumpka, Ala., Ms. Jones [who committed murder] said she did not recognize the girl who
committed her crimes. According to court filings, her mother was a drug
addict and her stepfather had sexually molested her. “Everybody I
loved, everybody I trusted, I was betrayed by,” Ms. Jones said.

      No, all that matters is killing this chicken to scare other monkeys, as the old Legalist saying has it.

      There is an odd irony here.  Some conservatives want us to believe that America is a "Christian society."  You would think that such a society would embrace the notions of forgiveness and rehabilitation symbolized by the New Testament figure of Jesus Christ, and not the image of a vengeful God seeking retribution that can be found in the OId Testament.  But, no.  Americans, and our legal system, turn away from Christian patience and love.

      America is a Legalist society.