The Very Intelligent Legal Minds of Star Trek
As a renowned Corporations professor once said, “I’m told that there are some intelligent people out there that like Star Trek, but I’ve never met one.” Months have since passed, but we have not forgotten! In the hopes of swaying Trek skeptics (trekptics?) at the Law School, we have painstakingly assembled a list of the best #lawyermoments from the greatest science fiction series of all time. Surely a show with this many lawyers can’t be bad?!
Perhaps the most famous instance of Star Trek lawyering—and one of the best episodes of Star Trek ever—is the legal argument between Captain Picard and his first officer, Commander Riker, in “The Measure of a Man.” The issue? Whether their android crewmate, Data, enjoys the same rights as a sentient lifeform. The hearing arises after Commander Maddox, a Starfleet cyberneticist, boards the Enterprise and announces his plan to disassemble Data and study his construction. When Data resigns in protest, Maddox asserts that Data, as a machine, has no right to refuse the procedure. Captain Picard takes the issue to the local starbase’s Judge Advocate General, Captain Phillipa Louvois, who concludes that the pre-Federation “Acts of Cumberland”—which are somehow binding—provide that artificial intelligence devices are property, not people. Originalist serve! Yas queen! “Data is a toaster,” Louvois says, ordering him to comply with the procedure.[1]
Captain Picard owns Commander Maddox with facts and logic.
Captain Picard demands a full trial and Captain Louvois appoints an unwilling Commander Riker to argue the other side of the case. After an impressive performance by Riker, the trial comes close to a loss for Data. But naturally, Captain Picard delivers a rousing speech in defense of civil liberties to save the day. Does Picard play fast and loose with the rules of evidence? Yes. Does he have a previous relationship with the judge that seriously compromises her objectivity? Also yes. But with the thespian talents of Patrick Stewart, anything is possible. Captain Louvois reverses her decision, concluding that the real issue of the case was whether Data has a soul, and that she must grant him “the freedom to explore that question himself.” Legal reasoning worthy of Anthony Kennedy.
The Federation aren’t the only ones with lawyers and Star Trek also gives a look into some truly alien legal systems—or surprisingly familiar ones. In Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Captain Kirk and Doctor McCoy find themselves in a Klingon show trial, defended by Klingon lawyer Colonel Worf, grandfather of the more famous Next Generation character. For the warlike Klingons, litigation is just another form of battle, it seems. Unfortunately, in this truly adversarial system, Colonel Worf’s role appears to be restricted to shouting objections to everything the prosecutor says. Still, he manages to save the heroes by pointing out that the evidence against them is purely circumstantial, demoting their punishment from execution to life in prison—from which, of course, they manage to escape. Klingons take the Rules of Evidence seriously.
Colonel Worf zealously defends his clients.
Another alien legal system appears in Deep Space Nine’s “Tribunal,” where Chief O’Brien is framed and put on trial by the totalitarian Cardassians. On Cardassia, however, no one is ever found not guilty. The trial exists to reassure the public that crime is under control and that the government is competent. O’Brien receives a kindly public defender whose job is to coax him into pleading guilty.[2] Cardassians get to see another criminal reconciled to the state; O’Brien gets the most painless execution possible. The future of plea deals? Of course, O’Brien’s superiors manage to expose the frame-up, and the Cardassians, seeing the potential for rehabilitation, release him in the interest of interstellar comity. His hapless lawyer, having received his first-ever victory in court, must suffer in O’Brien’s place.
This represents a mere tasting of the excitement (and relatability) which Star Trek can offer to anyone willing to boldly go and watch—and for those unwilling, pleasure can be taken in the fact that lawyers, much like cockroaches, will survive and proliferate across time and space.
Actual photo of a criminal appeal in the Fifth Circuit.
[1] It’s inspiring to see that in the utopian Star Trek future, judges still display naked animus towards the parties whose rights they are adjudicating.
[2] Which is, of course, nothing like American criminal cases. See Micah Schwartzbach, How Many Criminal Cases Actually Go to Trial?, Nolo, www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/how-criminal-cases-actually-go-trial.html (Aug. 23, 2024) (“The conservative estimate seems to be that over 90% of cases end in guilty pleas.”).
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Jason Vanger ’27 — nnk2gn@virginia.edu
Andrew Allard ’25 — tya2us@virginia.edu