Response Paper (6)

The holding of the case is in concurrence with the principles the judge used to make his decision. “The principle which lies at the bottom of the maxim volenti non fit injuria should be applied to such a case, and a widow should not, for the purpose of acquiring, as such, property rights, be permitted to allege a widowhood which she has wickedly and intentionally created” (152). The reasoning is that one cannot take the “fruit” of crime, or in this case one cannot take the inheritance of another through an unlawful act, or murder. It would also be a reproach of jurisprudence of the country if one could receive monetary items in the instance of one’s life being taken in a feloniously way. The dissenting opinion decides in the opposite way. The courts do not have the ability to change the guidelines of a testamentary, and the judge states, “I cannot find any support for the argument that the respondent’s succession to the property should be avoided because of his criminal act, when the laws are silent”(152). Therefore the criminal act and the testamentary should be handled as separate means in the courts, and the courts can simply not interfere with a dead man’s final testamentary. Public policy does not specifically define what should happen, or what form of punishment, in dealing with someone who acts criminally in order to gather monetary items. I believe the holding and the reasoning of the majority to best reflect Dworkin’s theory of “the