Letter to the editor: You say that if the government were to confiscate a portion of the wages of convicted burglars ...

shunhe on August 3, 2020

Hi @schicago,

Thanks for the question! So let’s take a look at the stimulus first. Someone’s basically saying that the government would be justified in confiscating a portion of burglars’ wages, even if it were a form of stealing. And the reason for this is because the government’s confiscating the wages to fund an account to compensate burglary victims.

Now we’re asked for a principle that would most hep to support the argument in the letter to the editor. So we have to put aside what we might personally believe and think: if this answer choice were true, would it support the argument? Now look at (C), which tells us that the motive prompting an action determines whether or not that action is justified. That means that we can tell whether or not an action is justified by looking only at the motive (since it “determines” whether the action is justified). Well, what’s the motive here? To compensate burglary victims. That seems like a pretty good motive. So since the motive is good, the action should be justified. And so (C) is the correct answer, since if we believe this principle, based on what we’re told in the stimulus the action should be justified.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.