Practice question · Select all that apply
Why does the principle of ultima ratio bear chiefly on the legislator rather than on the judge?
Hints
- Three explain who makes the choice; one gives a court a power it does not have.
- The choice of instrument is made at the drafting stage.
Show the answer
- B. It asks whether a less burdensome instrument would protect the good adequately, which is a choice made when the offence is created
- C. It concerns whether criminal law should reach the conduct at all, not how a given case is decided
- D. A court cannot decline to apply a valid offence on the ground that a fine would have sufficed
Why
The fourth would turn a principle of criminal policy into a defence. Judges apply the offences they are given; the question whether the conduct should have been an offence at all was answered when it was enacted, and its judicial enforcement runs only through constitutional review with a deliberately deferential standard.
Practise The Other Limits on the Power to Punish
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