Monday, November 3, 2014
Ironies in Law
The aspect of today's reading that surprised me the most was how contradictory the legal statements of the constitutional article were. The first two sentences claim that all land owned by the state within the forest preserve will be "forever kept as wild forest lands" where there will be no destruction of timber whatsoever nor will the land ever be put up for sale or lease. However, the third sentence already begins the contradictions, stating "Nothing herein contained shall prevent the state from constructing, completing and maintaining any highway" (New York Constitution Article XIV). There is more language working around and negating the "forever wild" law than actually establishing it. For such an important legal movement - nearly unprecedented at its time - the language seems to be more concerned with bypassing the law than anything else. My purpose in writing this blog post to begin questioning this practice. Is this law important enough to uphold? Many seem to think so, and yet continually legislation is passed slowly negating it piece by piece. Is this something that people should stand up against, or is moving past it a necessary part of human progress? Obviously this is a complicated question as there are so many groups with rights and interests in the park, but I believe it's something worth bringing up in a formal context.
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I felt the same way about this constitutional article. As we talked about in Janelle's section, the first 2 or 3 sentences were the only ones with any real content in regard to the protection of the nature of the Adirondacks. The entirety of the article after those sentences serves to create exceptions to the rule. You're right when you say that are "slowly negating" the law. After a while of adding these exceptions and loopholes, there will no longer be anything left of the original law. I do think this law is important enough to uphold, but I think it is very difficult to cap human progression. Therefore, now that people have realized they can create these exceptions for their own conveniences while still keeping the law TECHNICALLY intact, there is no telling how far they will take it, and if this progression will ever stop.
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