Necessity
In U.S. criminal law, necessity may be either a possible justification or an exculpation for breaking the law. Defendants seeking to rely on this defense argue that they should not be held liable for their actions as a crime because their conduct was necessary to prevent some greater harm and when that conduct is not excused under some other more specific provision of law such as self defense. Except for a few statutory exemptions and in some medical cases there is no corresponding defense in English law.
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Famous quotes containing the word necessity:
“I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. There is a physical difference between the two, which, in my judgement, will probably for ever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I ... am in favour of the race to which I belong having the superior position.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“I complacently accepted the social order in which I was brought up. I probably would have continued in my complacency if the happy necessity of self-support had not fallen to my lot; if self-support had not deepened and widened my contacts and my experience.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“Comes over one an absolute necessity to move. And what is more, to move in some particular direction. A double necessity then: to get on the move, and to know whither.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)