CHAPTER 7: FOCUS LOCK - FOCUS SHIFT

 

In making a law, the factual focus never shifts.  A lawmaker looks down from his perch on top of the Triangle of Law®, and decides whether to apply one of the three permutations of a law to the same flow of conduct from source to recipient in circumstances. To review, the three permutations of a law are

  1. The Row A permutation: a command for positive conduct  (See Row A on the periodic table of the elements of a law)
  2. The Row B permutation: a permission for either positive or negative conduct (See Row B on the periodic table of the elements of a law), or
  3. The Row C permutation: a command for negative conduct (See Row C on the periodic table of the elements of a law).
 The legal focus, however, can shift within a law.  It can shift from
  1. Focus on the Source which entails binding a law to a source with weight (Click Here) to
  2. Focus on the Lawmaker which entails issuing a law (Click Here) to
  3. Focus on the Recipient which entails binding a law to a recipient with standing (Click Here)

Because the legal focus can shift, legal thinkers sometimes get dizzy, lose their balance and become confused. For example, in colloquial usage, legal thinkers often use the word 'right' to express the meaning that we have attached to the word 'privilege' and vice versa.  There is a simple technique to prevent any confusion. In formulating the legal ideas you want to express, don't fall into the trap of focus lock (See, the monolithic error): fixating - like a deer in the headlights - on only one of the three activities in which a lawmaker engages in the process of making a law to the exclusion of the other two.  Be mindful of all three.  Keep in mind that

  1. a duty is the same law as a command is the same law as a right, i.e., a command is a law in which both weight and standing are present, and
  2. a privilege is the same law as a permission is the same law as a no-right, i.e., a permission is a law in which neither weight nor standing are present (See the periodic table of the elements of a law).
Thus, when you speak about a right, you are also implicitly speaking about a duty and a command but your focus is on a recipient of conduct. When you speak about a privilege you are also implicitly speaking about a permission and about a no-right but with a focus on a source of conduct. When you are speaking about a command, you are also implicitly speaking about a duty and a right but with a focus on a lawmaker.
 
Think of a coin. On one side is a duty and the other is a right. Such a coin is called a command.  On one side of the coin we call a permission is a privilege and on the other is a no-right. Focus lock occurs when we forget to look at a duty and a right - as two sides of the same command coin or forget to look at a privilege and a no-right as two sides of the same permission coin.