I am aware that many of my contemporaries maintain that nations are never their own masters here below, and that they necessarily obey some insurmountable and unintelligent power, arising from anterior events, from their race, or from the soil and climate of their country. Such principles are false and cowardly; such principles can never produce aught but feeble men and pusillanimous nations. Providence has not created mankind entirely independent or entirely free. It is true that around every man a fatal circle is traced beyond which he cannot pass; but within the wide verge of that circle he is powerful and free; as it is with man, so with communities.
-- Democracy in America
A conservative leaning sort voiced concern that our society was not respecting "free will" these days enough. "Providence has not created mankind entirely independent or entirely free." Tocqueville hits in here, even if he is not quite concerned here about insanity. [As someone interested in criminal justice, perhaps, he would connect the two.] The thread overall is worth a read.
We are not completely free, thus our responsibility for our actions should be correspondingly limited somewhat. This is most clearly seen in the case of the death penalty. I am against the death penalty in part because society is in some way a cause of crime -- it has no right to execute as if the murderer was fully to blame. The case is clearer in various situations where the person might be in some fashion mentally unfit, there are other mitigating factors involved, or generally that justice is always so "rough" that an absolute penalty is not warranted.
The theme also arises in lesser crimes as well as in our everyday lives. And, the changing views of "free will" takes into consideration any number of factors too. Thus, traditionally, things like battered women defenses were not raised. Because they are wrong? Or, stereotypical incomplete understanding of the facts of life? After all, the "men are men" defense was used for years. Likewise, what about drug crimes? Should various factors, including the environment one grows up in as well as the harms of certain punishments, be taken into account?
"Degme" on the thread a bit peevishly referenced "conservatives" who are selective in being concerned with free will. Thus, economic crimes are perhaps ignored as are war crimes because they are proper or just part of the nature of things. Free will, huh? And, going back to the Bush Agenda, let's understand the results of some of those actions, including a good deal of social unrest and violence. Results of the "free will" of the usual suspects.
Suspects let off the hook all too often. Where has free will gone?