Precedent Is Important, But--

Suppose that someone who needs something approaches us for some service⎯a service that is reasonable and honorable and easily within our reach. And suppose that we hide behind the actual or alleged fear of precedent in refusing the favor. In short, suppose we say: “I’d like to do it for you, but if I do it for you, I’ll have to do it for everyone. I am so sorry.” Certainly this sounds like logic, and certainly it can be used as a convenient way out. But let’s see where such logic could lead: Suppose that a boat overturns and there are several men in danger of drowning and we refuse to save any of them because we can’t save all of them. To add other illustrations: Suppose that if we can’t go to everyone’s party, we assume that we shouldn’t go to anyone’s party; suppose that if we can’t invite everyone to dinner, we don’t invite anyone to dinner. These are samples of what such seemingly simple logic could lead to if pursued to absurdity. We know to begin with that, individually, we can’t do something for everyone. But should this be construed as a valid reason why we shouldn’t do anything for anyone? The fact is that if we didn’t ever do anything for anyone that we couldn’t do for everyone, we would never do anything for anyone. Of course, precedent is important; and departure from precedent can be embarrassing. And certainly under some circumstances we may be clearly prevented by precedent; under some circumstances we may be clearly bound by invariable rules and by the intent and letter of the law. But if we always let precedent prevent us from doing something we could do and should do, we may never do very much of anything for anyone, or for ourselves either. When the right of discretion and decision is ours, and when the facts seem to justify, just because we can’t do something for everybody is no reason why we shouldn’t do something for somebody. If we wait until we can do something for everyone, we’ll never do anything for anyone.