This week: dragging the judicial process down into the political mud would have been familiar to the citizens of ancient Athens where justice was anything but blind. Also: the feast day of St Edmund of Abingdon, Parisian perspectives on the French Revolution, and Victorian London’s deadline.
A rule of all modern constitutions is that courts should remain apolitical. In reality, however, separation of powers is an ideal, not a fact. Trials should not be popularity contests, nor should elections be litigated – but this can be a hard separation to achieve. While Donald Trump argues that his prosecutors are making his case political and might even pardon himself if re-elected, he is not the only politician blurring the line between executive and judicial power. This situation would be recognisable to the ancient Greeks.
