Law I / The Other Limits on the Power to Punish
Practice question · Fill in the blanks

Complete the account of the limits on the power to punish.

Criminal law may protect only interests of sufficient importance, called legal ______. The requirement that it be used only where a lesser instrument will not do is ______. Article 5 of the Criminal Code provides that there is no penalty without intent or ______. Article 15 of the Constitution prohibits torture and inhuman or degrading punishment, and abolishes the ______ penalty.

Word bank: goods · subsidiarity · negligence · death · fragmentariness · humanity

Hints
  1. The second blank names the branch of ultima ratio about choosing between instruments.
  2. The bank contains a second branch of ultima ratio that is not the answer here.
Show the answer

Criminal law may protect only interests of sufficient importance, called legal goods. The requirement that it be used only where a lesser instrument will not do is subsidiarity. Article 5 of the Criminal Code provides that there is no penalty without intent or negligence. Article 15 of the Constitution prohibits torture and inhuman or degrading punishment, and abolishes the death penalty.

Why

The bank deliberately holds both branches of ultima ratio. Subsidiarity is about choosing between instruments for the same attack; fragmentariness is about protecting a good only against the gravest forms of attack rather than against all of them. They point the same way and answer different questions.

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