Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do

by Michael J. Sandel

both the Republican inquisitor and the Clinton defender believed that something important was at stake in establishing whether Clinton had lied or merely misled and deceived. Their spirited colloquy over the L word—“Did he lie?”—supports the Kantian thought that there is a morally relevant difference between a lie and a misleading truth. But what could that difference be? The intention is arguably the same in both cases. Whether I lie to the murderer at the door or offer him a clever evasion, my intention is to mislead him into thinking that my friend is not hiding in my house. And on Kant’s moral theory, it’s the intention, or motive, that matters. The difference, I think, is this: A carefully crafted evasion pays homage to the duty of truth-telling in a way that an outright lie does not. Anyone who goes to the bother of concocting a misleading but technically true statement when a simple lie would do expresses, however obliquely, respect for the moral law. A misleading truth includes two motives, not one. If I simply lie to the murderer, I act out of one motive—to protect my friend from harm. If I tell the murderer that I recently saw my friend at the grocery store, I act out of two motives—to protect my friend and at the same time to uphold the duty to tell the truth. In both cases, I am pursuing an admirable goal, that of protecting my friend. But only in the second case do I pursue this goal in a way that accords with the motive of duty.