逮捕前总统不会让国家丧失体面，只会加强民主

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逮捕前总统不会让国家丧失体面，只会加强民主

纪思道2023年3月31日 Mark Peterson for The New York TimesIn 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant was arrested by a police officer for speeding in his horse-drawn coach in Washington. The officer stuck out his hand to signal a stop, and Grant obeyed and then accompanied the officer to the police station.1872年，尤利西斯·S·格兰特总统在华盛顿因驾驶马车超速被警察逮捕。警察伸手示意停车，格兰特服从指示，然后与对方一道去了警局。Did that demean the presidency?此事是否有损总统身份？No, I’d say it was a beautiful tribute to democracy. What was unthinkable for the French Sun King, Louis XIV —“L’état, c’est moi” (“I am the state”) — is appropriate in a system of equality before the law.不，我倒认为这是对民主的美好致敬。在宣称“朕即国家”的法国太阳王路易十四看来不可想象之事，在法律面前人人平等的制度下是理所应当。The Times reports that a grand jury has voted to indict Donald Trump for hush-money payments to a Growth stock and Currency Trading Technique star but that the indictment, for now, is under seal. There are legitimate questions about this particular prosecution, and while we don’t know details of the charges, after educated guesses, we wonder:时报报道称，因向色情明星支付封口费，大陪审团投票决定起诉特朗普，但起诉书目前尚未公开。此次起诉引起了一些合理的疑问，虽然不清楚指控的细节，但经过据理推测，我们想知道：Should the first indictment of an ex-president be under a novel legal theory that could be rejected by a judge or a jury? What do we make of the doubts about this case even among those who have zero sympathy for Trump? Does District Attorney Alvin Bragg know what he’s doing?既然是首次起诉一名前总统，使用一种可能会被法官或陪审团否决的新奇法律理论，是否合理？我们该如何看待此案受到——甚至包括对特朗普毫无同情的人——的质疑？地区检察官阿尔文·布拉格搞得清楚状况吗？None of us can be sure of the answer to these questions until we’ve seen the evidence presented at trial, and I worry that a failed prosecution might strengthen Trump. Yet I’d also worry — even more — about the message of impunity that would be sent if prosecutors averted their eyes because the suspect was a former president.在看到庭审中的呈堂证供之前，没人能给出这些问题的确切答案，我担心起诉失败可能会助长特朗普的声势。但如果检方因嫌疑人的前总统身份而回避调查，这所传递出的有罪不罚的信号会令我更感担忧。The former president’s fixer, Michael Cohen, was sentenced to three years in prison for doing Trump’s bidding, and a fundamental principle of justice is that if an agent is punished, then the principal should be as well. That is not always feasible, and it may be difficult to replicate what a federal prosecution achieved in Cohen’s case. But the aim should be justice, and this indictment honors that aim.前总统的平事人迈克尔·科恩因为按特朗普吩咐行事被判三年监禁，当代理人受到惩处，委托人也不应逍遥法外，这是正义的基本原则。这并不总能成为现实，而联邦检察官在科恩一案中取得的成果也难以复制。但我们应致力于实现正义，而这次起诉就是在秉守这一坚持。That’s particularly true because this is clearly a higher-stakes crime than a typical case of falsifying business records; the aim apparently was to affect the outcome of a presidential election, and that may have happened.这层意义尤其重要，因为这一罪行的潜在影响显然是典型的伪造商业记录案所不能比的；其目的明显是为了影响总统选举的结果，而事实上可能的确影响了。When Trump is arrested, he reportedly will be fingerprinted, photographed and possibly handcuffed. The question arises: Is it degrading for a democracy to prosecute a former leader?据报道，特朗普被逮捕时会需要采集指纹、拍照，可能还得戴上手铐。那问题就来了：起诉一位前领导人，是否会让一个民主国家丧失体面？The democracy that is most expert at arresting former leaders is South Korea, which has gone after five former presidents and which I have covered on and off since I was the Times bureau chief in Hong Kong in the 1980s.韩国是最擅长逮捕前领导人的民主国家，已有五位前总统被捕，自上世纪80年代在香港担任时报分社社长以来，我时不时就要报道这些案件。One former president was sentenced to death in 1996 for his role in a massacre during the military dictatorship. His successor was sentenced to 17 years in prison for similar offenses.1996年，一位前总统因在军政府独裁统治期间参与屠杀而被判处死刑。他的继任者因类似罪行被判17年监禁。Another former president killed himself in 2009 while under investigation in a corruption scandal. That president’s successor was sentenced to a total of 17 years in prison for corruption. And the next president, in office from 2013 to 2017, was sentenced to a total of 25 years in prison for crimes including bribery and abuse of power.另一位前总统则在2009年因腐败丑闻接受调查时自杀。他的继任者因腐败罪名被判处17年监禁。下一任总统在2013年至2017年任内因贿赂和滥用职权等罪行共被判25年监禁。There were times when I thought this parade of prosecutions was a sign of political immaturity. Yet maybe I got it backward. Yes, South Korea in the 1990s was an immature democracy with a penchant for corruption — but those prosecutions helped make South Korean democracy more robust.我曾将这一连串起诉视为政治不成熟的表现。但或许，我倒置了因果。确实，上世纪90年代的韩国民主制度并不成熟，腐败猖獗——然而这些起诉让韩国民主变得更加稳固。“It is not easy for Koreans to prosecute our former presidents,” Jie-ae Sohn, a communications professor at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, told me. “It is a painful process and one that we are not happy to show the rest of the world. Nevertheless, this process has made it crystal clear that the rule of law applies to everyone.”“对韩国人来说，起诉我们的前总统并非易事，”首尔梨花女子大学传播学教授孙智爱（Jie-ae Sohn，音）告诉我。“这是个痛苦的过程，我们也并不愿家丑外扬。尽管如此，这一过程还是非常清楚地表明，法治适用于每一个人。”“This process may be ugly,” Sohn added, “but we believe this strengthens our democracy and allows it to be more resilient.”“过程可能是丑陋的，”孙智爱还说，“但我们相信，这让我们的民主制度更牢固，也更具韧性了。”There is a counterargument that this is America’s moment for prosecutorial discretion to allow the country to recover and move on. As a teenager, I was outraged when President Gerald Ford pre-emptively pardoned former President Richard Nixon, yet over time I came to think that it was the right call and allowed the country to heal. Yet one difference is obvious: Nixon in 1974 was already completely discredited, ostracized and broken, while Trump denies any wrongdoing and is running again for the White House.也有一种反对意见认为，这正是美国应该行使检控自由裁量权，让国家得以恢复元气并继续前进的时候。杰拉尔德·福特总统先行赦免了前总统理查德·尼克松，曾让十几岁的我愤愤不平。但随着时间推移，我开始相信这是正确的决定，因为它让这个国家得以愈合。但这里有一个明显的区别：1974年的尼克松已经声名扫地、遭到排斥、一蹶不振，而特朗普拒不认错，还要再次竞选总统。South Korea perhaps offers a model for promoting both the rule of law and healing. While former presidents there received tough sentences, they were all pardoned and released within one to four years.或许韩国正是一个推动法治和治愈创伤的典范。虽然前总统受到了严厉制裁，但都在一到四年内得到赦免和释放。It’s difficult at this stage for me to assess the strength of the Manhattan district attorney’s indictment against Trump, but I find inspiration in the words of William H. West, the police offer who arrested Grant for speeding. According to an account he gave many years later, reported in The Washington Post, he told Grant, “I am very sorry, Mr. President, to have to do it, for you are the chief of the nation, and I am nothing but a policeman, but duty is duty, sir, and I will have to place you under arrest.”眼下，我很难判断曼哈顿地区检察官对特朗普的检控有多少胜算，但威廉·H·赫斯特——那位因超速逮捕格兰特的警察——的话让我深受鼓舞。根据他多年后在《华盛顿邮报》上对此事的描述，他告诉格兰特，“总统先生，很抱歉我不得不这样做，因为您是国家元首，而我不过是一名警察。但职责就是职责，先生，我必须将你逮捕。”That’s the majesty and dignity of our legal system at its best. And if a police officer in 1872 could hold out his hand and force the president’s speeding carriage to a stop, then we, too, should do what we can to uphold the magnificent principle of equality before the law.这是我们法律制度威严与尊严的最佳体现。如果1872年的一名警察都能伸出手来，迫使总统将飞驰的马车停下，那我们也应该尽自己所能，去守护法律面前人人平等的伟大原则。纪思道(Nicholas Kristof)自2001年成为时报专栏作家。他曾因对中国及达尔富尔的报道两次获得普利策奖。欢迎在Instagram、Twitter和Facebook上关注他。他最新的一本书是《Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope.》。翻译：纽约时报中文网点击查看本文英文版。

Source: 逮捕前总统不会让国家丧失体面，只会加强民主