The Leftists Won't Like the New Rules

 Judge Andrew Napolitano explain why Judge Engoran's ruling in the New York fraud case is so wrong.  We have all read about the 8th Amendment issues with excessive fines.  That is the Amendment that bars cruel and unusual punishments.  But as Napolitano tells it, there is even stronger reasons buried in the common law.  You can find his article at Ammoland entitled Donald Trump and Government Theft.

When U.S. Supreme Court Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo described the basic principles of tort law in one easy line, he was reflecting upon centuries of Anglo-American jurisprudence. His dictum of wrong first and remedy afterward was essentially based on the common law understanding that an injured party can only seek damages for a wrong actually caused.

The legal and philosophical essence of wrongness is harm. The law does not concern itself with trifles or with theoretical wrongs, but only wrongs that have caused palpable and measurable harm.

The rational corollary to harm first and remedy later is that where there is no harm, there can be no remedy. Were this not the case, then a crazy plaintiff could drag a hapless defendant into court for all sorts of fanciful or theoretical or immeasurable or speculative claims — none of which caused harm.

...snip...

The government created a phantom harm by arguing to the court that Trump’s corporation was not fully accurate in its loan applications and thus was charged a lower interest rate on the loans than it should have been charged had it been accurate; and thus it earned more income on its use of the money it borrowed than would have been the case had it scrupulously reported the value of its pledged assets; and thus — somehow — the government ought to be able to confiscate the excess income plus interest.

This, of course, defies the no-damages-without-breach-of-a-duty principle and no-damages-without-caused-harm principle that have been the bedrock of American tort law. It also redefines fraud.

The government told the court that Trump defrauded his lenders by inaccurately stating his assets. If you borrow $100 million from a bank and pledge as security a building worth $2 billion, you will get more favorable loan terms — a lower interest rate — than if you pledged as security a building worth $1 billion. But Trump’s banks did their own due diligence on the value of the assets he pledged, and they told the court that they were satisfied with Trump’s valuations.

So, the State of New York, that suffered no harm, therefore should have no remedy.  It has inserted itself between two parties that were satisfied with a mutual transaction, so that it could steal for itself some $400 million of Trump organization money. It should be clear that this can not stand, for if it did, it could be used against any of us.

Please note, once again, that I am not a "Trump" guy. He has many flaws, as do all of us. At the same time, Trump in office did most things right, unlike the desiccated puppet for whom the Democrats...er...Communist/Socialist stole the election. Now, to keep Trump from getting back into office, the Communist/Socialists are using the law and asserting bizarre theories, also known as lawfare.  They want to put him in prison or failing that to impoverish him. None of it is right, and the truth is they are making a martyr of him. But even worse is that they are making a mockery of the law, and eventually they are not going to like the rules being used against them.