Moral Befuddlement in Ferguson

"It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters."

Edmund Burke's insight returned to mind while watching cable news coverage of the rampage in Ferguson, Missouri, after St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch announced that officer Darren Wilson would not be indicted in the shooting death of Michael Brown.

The rioting, looting, arson and gunfire that began after McCulloch relayed the grand jury's decision, a decision long predicted and anticipated, revealed the unspoken truth about Ferguson.

The problem in Ferguson is not the 53-man police department. The problem is the hoodlum element those Ferguson cops have to police, who, Monday night, burned and pillaged the stores on the main streets of their own community.

The police were portraits in restraint as they were cursed and showered with rocks, bottles and Molotov cocktails. If the police were at fault at all, it was in their refusal to use the necessary force to stop a rampaging mob that destroyed the lives and livelihoods of honest businessmen and women of Ferguson.

Many will not be able to rebuild their stores. Many will not be able to get insurance. Many will give up and move away, the investment of a lifetime lost in a night of thuggery.

One recalls that the Detroit riot of 1967 was the beginning of the end of Motown. And it was decades before D.C. fully recovered from the riot and arson that followed the assassination of Dr. King.

In the wake of the Ferguson riot, some seek absolution for the rioters by redistributing responsibility to police and prosecutor.

Why, they demand, did McCulloch wait until 8 p.m., St. Louis time, to report the grand jury findings? Why did he wait until after dark?

Well, perhaps it was to give time for kids to get home from school and off the playgrounds, for businesses to close and shutter down, for rush hour to end. Hoodlums from Ferguson earlier stormed onto I-70 and shut down the Interstate -- the way home for tens of thousands of St. Louisans.

Whatever reason McCulloch had for waiting until 8 p.m. does not explain or excuse the rampant criminality that lasted until midnight.

"No justice, no peace!" has been a howl of the protesters.

What they mean is strikingly clear: Michael Brown, one of us, is dead. Therefore, this cop, Darren Wilson, must go on trial for his life.

But this is not justice in America. We have a legal process to determine who was in the right and who in the wrong, and whether a crime has been committed by a policeman in the use of deadly force.