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Lady Justice, we’ve been told, is blind. Or at least she’s supposed to be — rendering the right verdicts without any partiality or consideration of one’s ethnicity, class status, or political affiliation.
That was the ideal. The old system. There was only one tier, or so it went.
No longer. Now in America, we have a rapidly metastasizing and increasingly obvious two-tiered system of justice, which is no justice at all.
In this bifurcated court of law, special attention is paid, and punitive action is dealt, to “offenders” on the conservative side of the political spectrum. You know, those dangerous pro-life activists. Or pastors who defied lockdown orders because they knew that church is far more essential than liquor stores and casinos.
Meanwhile, Antifa activists who laid siege to a federal building for weeks and Black Lives Matter (BLM) mobs who burned city blocks during our summer of “fiery but mostly peaceful” protests aren’t even issued a summons.
Lady Justice is apparently peeking, but only out of her right eye.
The latest example of our two-tiered system of justice involves none other than two of the most nefarious actors you could ever imagine: Two sweet grandmas who have given their lives to defend unborn children in America against our ghastly abortion regime.
As the Standing for Freedom Center reported on September 18:
“Three more pro-life protesters were convicted for ‘violence’ under the Freedom of Access to Clinics Entrances (FACE) Act on Friday, meaning they could spend up to 11 years in prison and be forced to pay a $350,000 fine.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) alleges that the three are guilty of engaging in a conspiracy to ‘create a blockade’ preventing access to the Washington Surgi-Clinic, an abortion facility in Washington, D.C., that performs late-term abortions. The DOJ also claimed in its press release that two of the defendants, Joan Bell and Jean Marshall, ‘forcefully entered the clinic and set about blockading two clinic doors using their bodies, furniture, chains and ropes’ and used a ‘physical obstruction to injure, intimidate and interfere with the clinic’s employees and a patient, because they were providing or obtaining reproductive health services.’
Bell is 74 years old and Marshall is 73.”
That’s right, the Department of Justice has apparently decided that two septuagenarians advocating for life during a sit-in protest at an abortion clinic are a top threat to peace in our land. This is, of course, despite the fact that approximately 100 attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers by pro-abortion activists have occurred over the past 18 months and only two arrests have been made.
But it gets worse. Freedom Center also notes that “all three of the protestors were immediately incarcerated prior to official sentencing because both the prosecution and U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly assert that they committed ‘a crime of violence.’”
What happened to equal justice under the law? What happened to equal weights and measures?
Washington D.C. is currently in the midst of a skyrocketing crime wave — with real crimes and real violence being committed on a daily basis by real criminals. Fox News reports that according to data from the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, “almost all crimes have soared from this time last year. As of Aug. 18, the nation’s capital has experienced a 63% increase in robberies, a 27% increase in homicides, a 14% increase in sexual abuse and a 4% increase in assault with a deadly weapon.”
And what is the Department of Justice — or should we say the Department of (In)Justice — doing about the real violence in their literal backyard? Nothing. Instead, they are throwing pro-lifers into pre-sentencing holding cells.
Furthermore, the Associated Press recorded, “In Portland, Oregon — where demonstrations, many turning violent, occurred nightly for months— about 60 of the roughly 100 cases that were brought have been dismissed, court records show.”
The message seems to be coming across loud and clear: Lenience for the left and a hammer for the right.
What might the one true Judge, the Lord, think of this? Proverbs 17:15 makes it clear:
“Acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent— the LORD detests them both.”
This ever-expanding two-tiered justice system in America — where conservatives have the book thrown at them for minor offenses at best, and are even locked up as they await sentencing, but violent criminals and repeat offenders are often released right back onto the streets — is detestable to God. Which means it should be an affront to every Christian in America as well.
Christians are commanded to pursue justice because our God is a God of perfect justice. And in His wise design, God tasked our civil rulers to exercise their authority in such a way as to both honor His ultimate jurisdiction over all of creation and reflect His righteous character by applying equal justice under the law for all.
The actions we are seeing, on a near daily basis, with Christians and conservatives harassed and targeted by federal authorities simply prove to underscore how far away from God’s standards our current government has fallen.
Christian citizens must not blink or shrink at such a time as this. Yes, it can be frightening when we see the state come after us with all of its police power. But Jesus has words for His followers in just such a time as this:
“‘In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.’”
–John 16:33
One day every U.S. District Court judge and every Department of Justice attorney will be called before God’s bench to answer for the lives they lived and the justice they did, or didn’t, deliver.
And on that day, there will be only standard for judgement, only one tier of justice — the eternal, perfect, enduring, righteous law of God.
Their only hope on that day — just as it is the only hope for the faithful Christian pro-life activists currently sitting behind bars in a federal jail — will be in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Pray that they repent and find the gracious hope of unmerited forgiveness before then. But until then, pray that true justice is once again done in our land. Pray that Lady Justice stops peeking out of that blindfold to the right and closes both eyes for good.
Ready to dive deeper into the intersection of faith and politics? Head over to our Theology of Politics series page, where we’ve published several long-form pieces to help Christians navigate where their faith should direct them on political issues.