I think it's time we broke for lunch (2011)
I think it's time we broke for lunch…
Court rulings depend partly on when the judge last had a snackAROUND the world, courthouses are adorned with a statue of a blindfolded woman holding a set of scales and a sword: Justice personified. Her sword stands for the power of the court, her scales for the competing claims of the petitioners. The blindfold (a 15th-century innovation) represents the principle that justice should be blind. The law should be applied without fear or favour, with only cold reason and the facts of the case determining what happens to the accused. Lawyers, though, have long suspected that such lofty ideals are not always achieved in practice, even in well run judicial systems free from political meddling. Justice, say the cynics, is what the judge had for breakfast. Now they have proof. This article appeared in the Science & technology section of the print edition under the headline “I think it's time we broke for lunch…”From the April 16th 2011 editionDiscover stories from this section and more in the list of contentsExplore the edition