Search Results: 'Court of Judicial Review'

The Elasticity of Blame

Words: 2958 · Source Novel:: The Cangwu Hunt

Meng An is captured and his trial becomes a political theatre. The Han dynasty has now succeeded Qin, and the newly installed Court of Judicial Review inherits the case. An imperial secretary revives the precedent of You Jing and his associates, arguing that deliberately failing to punish murderous nobles equals deliberately releasing rebels—a crime for which public execution is the statutory sentence. However, the empress dowager's clan has already married into the Cangwu families. The final edict shows a new moral arithmetic: the junior hunters are demoted one rank; Meng An is quartered as a brigand; and the doctrine of *gu zong* is quietly amended to exclude acts committed “for collective serenity.” A later scholastic colophon notes that the same plea would resurface centuries hence, its moral elasticity stretched to the breaking point.