What is Justice?

I was thinking about these few questions today. What is justice?  What is individual justice? Who gets to define public or social justice? These are questions that I often think about when I read comments on news stories. Everyone seems to have their own view of what justice is; what punishment would or should fit the crime. Often times these views are more brutal than the crime in which they are meant to punish, in my personal opinion. And that is exactly where this topic goes; the subjectivity of justice.

Recently a local story came across my news feed in which an adult had sexual relations with a younger person, younger being described as lower than the "legally" stipulated age at which persons can make decisions to have these relations. The comments read as if I was looking into the minds of psychopaths and sociopath's dreams. Murder him, castrate him, were the normal responses, one even read to castrate him, put his castrated member into his mouth, tie him behind a vehicle and drag him until he died. Is that justice? Would those actions be justified as a result of what he and another had conspired to do willingly and voluntarily? At what point does the attempt at justice reach revenge, vengeance or immoral means to an immoral end?

Lysander Spooner had this to say of justice;

"The science of mine and thine --- the science of justice --- is the science of all human rights; of all a man's rights of person and property; of all his rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
It is the science which alone can tell any man what he can, and cannot, do; what he can, and cannot, have; what he can, and cannot, say, without infringing the rights of any other person.
It is the science of peace; and the only science of peace; since it is the science which alone can tell us on what conditions mankind can live in peace, or ought to live in peace, with each other.
These conditions are simply these: viz., first, that each man shall do, towards every other, all that justice requires him to do; as, for example, that he shall pay his debts, that he shall return borrowed or stolen property to its owner, and that he shall make reparation for any injury he may have done to the person or property of another.
The second condition is, that each man shall abstain from doing to another, anything which justice forbids him to do; as, for example, that he shall abstain from committing theft, robbery, arson, murder, or any other crime against the person or property of another."

The combined idea of justice in the public eye seems to be one of three outcomes; Incarceration, death, or monetary punishment and of course a combination of all three. All of these though come from one enforcement monopoly; The State. What moral right does the state have to do these things? Is it the transferred authority of the voting populace? How does one account for the individual preference of justice over the majority? If a man has a moral philosophy to not do harm to another, is it right that a man who has damaged his property be then harmed by the state, not by the victim’s wishes but by mandated "justice"? Does the individual have no say as to what should be seen as just in his eyes, whether that means to let the perpetrator go or to punish them as he wishes? Under our current system the right to exact justice by individuals is made illegal and a monopoly has risen to take control of such matters. The American legal system, in all its dysfunction, has created a way for government to gain off of the misdeeds of others even when no harm has befallen the state in the matter. This is where the question comes in of what moral right does the state have to punish anyone for crimes in which it was not harmed? Why is there mandated minimum sentencing for crimes in which there are no victims? Why is justice taken from the hands of those involved and given to a system that benefit from the results of its own rules and laws?

An eye for an eye, Is that justice?

In an attempt to explain personal views of justice some will say they believe in the old adage of "an eye for an eye". Can equal punishment be considered equal justice? If a person was to kill a man's spouse, and the victimized man believed in equal punishment to the action, would the killing of an innocent person who is married to the aggressor be justice? Could it not be said of the spouse, who has now been killed in response to the death of another, even though they had no knowledge or part in the act is somehow responsible for the act of their spouse in order to avenge justice to the victim, are they now not a victim themselves? Does this circle ever end? 

Can the attempted correction of a wrong be justified by preforming another wrong?
Is it justice for a man guilty only of selling a plant disapproved of by government to be sentenced to a life in a cage? Is it justice for a mother who provides pain reliving medicine to her child to be sentenced to a life in jail, all because the medicine is not approved by a government agency? Is it justice that a man or woman who have engaged in consenual sexual relations be punished, because of an arbitrary age of consent imposed by someone outside that relationship? Is it Justice that any amount of people are barred from being united in marriage by law, punishable by state enforcement?

Can Justice ever really be achieved? Can full restitution for any act of aggression really be made? Is it a subjective view on what would be justified compensation? Can an act performed in the name of justice be an injustice in itself? How can one ensure just compensation is made without further aggressing against another or against the primary aggressor?

There can be no justice in a world of unscrupulous men.

Again Lysander Spooner, 

"If there be such a natural principle as justice, it is necessarily the highest, and consequently the only and universal, law for all those matters to which it is naturally applicable. And, consequently, all human legislation is simply and always an assumption of authority and dominion, where no right of authority or dominion exists. It is, therefore, simply and always an intrusion, an absurdity, an usurpation, and a crime.
On the other hand, if there be no such natural principle as justice, there can be no such thing as dishonesty; and no possible act of either force or fraud, committed by one man against the person or property of another, can be said to be unjust or dishonest; or be complained of, or prohibited, or punished as such. In short, if there be no such principle as justice, there can be no such acts as crimes; and all the professions of governments, so called, that they exist, either in whole or in part, for the punishment or prevention of crimes, are professions that they exist for the punishment or prevention of what never existed, nor ever can exist. Such professions are therefore confessions that, so far as crimes are concerned, governments have no occasion to exist; that there is nothing for them to do, and that there is nothing that they can do. They are confessions that the governments exist for the punishment and prevention of acts that are, in their nature, simple impossibilities."