What is Justice?

As usual with important concepts, the term "justice" gets bandied around in conversation, statements and debate with little explanation.

If you ask anyone on the street or even lawyers and judges, you will hear a range of distinct, vague and inadequate answers.

That's because people don't discuss the meanings of terms.

People say things like, "Justice has been served." or, "We did not get justice."

As far as We can tell, there are two popular but distinct uses of the term "justice."

Legal Justice:

What is just is what the law says, especially how it is interpreted by lawyers.

Moral Justice:

What is just is what accords with someone's morality.

Legal Justice is what occurs with the conclusion of legal proceedings: the verdict, the ruling, the sentence, the outcome.

Moral Justice occurs when someone agrees that an act accords with their morals, what they think is wrong or right.

The problem with Legal Justice is that the courts, judges and lawyers are fallible and thereby may be mistaken in their decision. So, what was just may not be just.

The problem with Moral Justice is that it is subjective, so that two people may think the same act is both wrong and right respectively, just and unjust.

So, the term now appears useless.

We want justice to be objectively true despite fallible rulings and despite personal morality.

Now we see that justice will not afford us what we need it to be.

The pursuit of justice is therefore futile.

Justice is tied to subjective personal morals and so cannot be sought for its independent objectuive truth or certainty.

There is no justice, only morality.