...and what if you held all the cards?...

...or the coin? If you had the choice of sacrificing one to save thousands, would you do it? What gives you the authority to make that decision? Ever? Is it justice? Is it morality? Where do we draw the line? I was watching John Adams, the HBO miniseries a few weeks ago with a friend, and I noticed my increasing annoyance with a Mr. Dickinson of Pennsylvania. He was the only man in the First Continental Congress to hold out against building the Continental Army until the final vote. He refused to be moved. Why? Because he was a Quaker, and fundamentally opposed to violence of any sort. Of course, I have the benefit (or the curse) of hindsight. Mr. Dickinson was standing in the way of my America! Was Mr. Dickinson right or wrong? Let's examine the possible consequences: If Mr. Dickinson was able to sway the vote to his side, and encourage the other delegates to opt for the most peaceful activity possible, the United States would be another Canada or India or Australia. Sounds good, right? Not to us. But imagine: The future of the Western world was determined by a few dozen men in an unbearably hot room a couple hundred years ago. The question on everyone's minds? What right does Britain have? What rights do we have? I ask the same question of each one of us. How much power are we given? I realize that reducing the entire early history of the United States to a few moments in a chamber in Philadelphia is a rediculous exercise, but the point is this: Why do we choose to take things into our own hands and at what points? Defense and standing up for what we believe in is without a doubt something everyone must learn. But what of when it comes time for us to pull the trigger in the name of preventative justice? Nearly every story we are told has a good man and a bad one. The best stories are the ones in which the good man is good through and through - he does what is right no matter the circumstance, no matter how much the bad man deserves to be finished. In the moment when we ourselves feel the tension of the glorious moment when the villain will be vanquished, he is left hanging by a thread, untouched because it is right to spare him. It is just to spare him. But we are continually called by the allure of preventative justice. Sacrifice the vallain, save the innocent. What a tempting course of action. So what do you say? Would you take the reigns? Would you sacrifice one man to save a thousand? One hundred? Five?