... and this is not it.
From the rather old Osborn's Concise Law Dictionary at my elbow:
rule of law The doctrine of English law expounded by Dicey, in Law of the Constitution, that all men are equal before the law, whether they be officials or not ..., so that the acts of officials in carrying out the behests of the executive government are cognizable by the ordinary courts and judged by the ordinary law ... .
The rule of law is what prevents special favours or privileges being granted by those in power to themselves or their friends or agents -- or special disadvantages being imposed on their enemies.
No one is above the law is what it means, and its main practical effect is to counteract corruption -- the law "rules", people don't.
Generating commitment to the rule of law is central to efforts to build institutions in developing countries -- under the rule of law, and institutions that operate according to laws and established rules, rather than according to individuals' whims or prejudices and arbitrary decisions, societies can develop.
In French, the equivalent expression is
l'état de droit -- a state that is under law.
For example, the Inter-American Democratic Charter (of the Organization of American States, i.e. the nations of the Americas) states:
http://www.oas.org/charter/docs/resolution1_en_p4.htmArticle 3
Essential elements of representative democracy include, inter alia, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, access to and the exercise of power in accordance with the rule of law, the holding of periodic, free, and fair elections based on secret balloting and universal suffrage as an expression of the sovereignty of the people, the pluralistic system of political parties and organizations, and the separation of powers and independence of the branches of government.
The rule of law is what LIMITS the things that GOVERNMENTS may do.
It is *NOT* a rule that says that INDIVIDUALS must do what the government says they are to do.
The rights that are set out in the US Constitution, for instance, are expressions of this "law" that is supposed to rule -- limits on government action. The courts are (despite recent nattering in this forum to the contrary) empowered to enforce those limits. And of course, one of the limits on government action in your constitution is that governments
may not deny the equal protection of the law to anyone.
What these right-wingers are talking about is not
law, it is
order. (And on this, NBD's otherwise estimable Law & Order has it backwards.) The police are the forces of
order, not of law -- what they do is
law enforcement -- they are part of the executive branch of government, and carry out its instructions -- which promotes
order.
The courts are the forces of
law. They oversee the
legality of what the executive does in applying the legislature's decisions (laws). In a constitutional democracy, if the executive attempts to enforce a law that is contrary to the higher law (the constitution, the embodiment of the rule of law) -- e.g. by having its agents who issue marriage licences refuse to issue them to same-sex couples, thereby
violating the rule of law, governing by caprice rather than by constitution, making the individual rather than principle the basis on which the law applies -- it is the courts' job to rein it in.
The aim is, of course, a balance. Order could easily be achieved by force without bothering to make laws; on the other hand, without the executive having *some* recognized authority to enforce laws, there would be disorder and societal breakdown.
True civil disobedience occurs when that balance is not properly struck. When it is genuine, it is a disruption of
order in the service of the rule of law. It is a rebellion against
arbitrary action by the executive, which may or may not involve enforcing laws made by the legislature.
Judges who "may have gone against their own beliefs and stand up for the truth", where that truth is that the law that it is sought to enforce is contrary to the constitution -- is an arbitrary violation of individual rights -- are doing
exactly what the rule of law requires them to do.
And people who conscientiously disobey those laws are
promoting the rule of law, not "breaking" it.
The right-wing, as usual, and for its usual purposes -- maintaining order for its own benefit, at the expense of others' rights and freedoms -- has stated the exact reverse of the truth here.
.
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