There are large lacunae in the Outer Space Treaty, and as the article points out, it would be absurd to send someone to Mars to arrest someone per Article VI.
[Update later afternoon[
Sorry, link is fixed.
12 thoughts on “Murder In Space”
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We create a blue ribbon panel to investigate for several months and then hold nobody personally responsible. It’s worked a few times now.
Link is broken but I’m sure I’ll stumble on it later at IP.
How we deal with murderers will depend a lot on the nature of settlements.
Send up Aeneas Mackenzie.
In the novel “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” the danger of the airless environment and the ease by which someone could be “spaced” made for a very polite society. Those unable to conform to the social norms of civil behavior tended to very quickly suffer from tragic fatal accidents. I suspect on Mars fact will tend to follow fiction.
Are lynch mobs polite society?
Musk is clearly aiming for a private colony on Mars; although I am sure he doesn’t mind helping NASA get there as well. So “space law” would have to be developed my the Colonist themselves; think something like the Mayflower compact or some such. Each settlement/colony would likely have there own laws with some degree of cooperation between colonies.
I doubt Earth bound American leftists are going to be okay with Martian American millionaires not paying “their fair share” in taxes, eventually resulting in a “Utopia Planitia Tea Party”.
“I doubt Earth bound American leftists are going to be okay with Martian American millionaires not paying “their fair share” in taxes, eventually resulting in a “Utopia Planitia Tea Party”.”
By the 1967 Outer space treaty no country can claim sovereignty over Mars (or any other heavenly body). So the “American leftists” would be hard pressed to tax money wired/donated to an independent private Mars colony composed of expatriates who renounced their citizenship before they left earth. Think of it (the colony) as the ultimate Cayman Islands tax shelter. The Bank of Mars; free to accept donations (deposits) and pay said depositors tax-free interest. Tax shelters are huge; there could be 100’s of billions or even trillions of dollars parked on Mars to evade tax hungry governments back on earth.
Oh, don’t worry. There will be a large portion of the group making these new laws that are part of the Progressive Marxist coalition that is rampaging across the country.
“Oh, don’t worry. There will be a large portion of the group making these new laws that are part of the Progressive Marxist coalition that is rampaging across the country.”
There would very quickly be man different settlements on Mars from many different political/ethnic/religious/ideological persuasions; will be an interesting experiment in cultural natural selection.
No extradition Treaties between Mars and Earth; imagine some future Bernie Madoff type transferring billions to his “bank of Mars” account secretly. Then jumping bail before his fraud trial and immigrating to Mars; no extradition Treaty free as a bird. He wouldn’t even have to stay on Mars for the rest of his life, just avoid earth.
James C. Bennett’s U.S. Space Guard concept had one feature that the real-life Space Force does not:
“It is worth pointing out that USSG officers would be, like Coast Guardsmen, officers of the U.S. government capable of operating as a constabulary. This is in contrast to NASA personnel (who are only employees, not officers, of the government) and military personnel (who are forbidden under the Posse Comitatus Act from exercising police powers over civilians). To date, there have been no instances of needing to exercise police powers in space. However, as the number and duration of missions increase, this will inevitably change: At some point, having constabulary officers with civil authority and training available will be useful.
https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/proposing-a-coast-guard-for-space