Exclusions in Kant's Justice

           In Immanuel Kant’s “A Definition of Justice”, he is in concurrence with Aristotle on the bases that justice is an external issue. Accordingly, he describes justice as a state where the will of one person can be coexisting with another without disrupting or restricting the freedom of the latter.  Along with this description in order for justice to be applicable to society it must follow three conditions. First, “it applies only to the external and practical relationships of one person to another in which their actions can in fact exert an influence on each other”. (150) Second, “it applies only to the relationship of a will to another person’s will, not to his wishes or desires”. (150) Third, “justice does not take into consideration the matter of the will”. (150) Therefore, in accord with these conditions, justice should be used to keep order between relationships and altercations between humans.

            However, Kant also establishes the idea of the right of necessity, “necessity has no law; but there still cannot be any necessity that will make what is unjust legal”. (156) The example he uses to illustrate this point is a scenario of two shipwrecked men who both are in equal danger of dying. Yet, in the fight for survival one man pushes the other of the plank to have himself. Under Kant’s definition of justice and necessity he states that while the man may have to battle with some moral issues, he will not face any penal issues. The assailant’s act was completely voluntary, he acknowledged of the possible outcome of the victim, and was not coerced by any external factors besides the fear of his own survival.

Furthermore, in class we discussed the basic principles of Kant’s philosophy.  We discussed deontology and categorical imperatives. Through these we know three conditions: that the maxim of every action must be applicable as a universal law; to act in such a way that you always treat humanity (whether in yourself or another), never simply as a means, but always as an end-in-itself; and to act in accordance with the maxim of a member giving universal laws for a merely possible kingdom of ends. So under the first categorical imperative, is the issue of self preservation through violence a maxim for a universal law? Or in the second in the imperative, do the ends (possible survival) succeed the means (murder)? Should the act of self preservation through violence be considered or evaluated under the laws of justice, or does the right of necessity exclude it?