RE: Vigilantism is justified when the U.S. government has failed to enforce the law.

Before I begin my rebuttal, I would quickly like to ask the voters one thing: There are a lot of negative stigmas associated with the term 'vigilante', so for the sake of fairness, I'd like you all to please remove these stigmas, as the CON cannot possibly ask me to justify negative thoughts and feelings. As far as my PEACA evidence (South Africa) is concerned, keep in mind that a vigilante group in one region is little different than one in another region; a rape in one place is rape in another, same for murder, arson, theft, etc, and the U.S. government is just as capable of failure (perhaps moreso) than any other government on the planet. My opponent first brings up this argument on the KKK, who he alleges are a vigilante group. I'll respond to this in three ways. 1. Look back to my definition of vigilantism, which, coming from the American University Law Review, is a more credible source than wikipedia. One criterion for being a vigilante is that the government has to FAIL TO ENFORCE THE LAW. If, as my opponent claims, the KKK killed innocents, then that would mean that the government had not failed to enforce the law, thus, while the actions of the KKK are not justified, they are not a vigilante group, putting them outside the boundaries of this resolution. 2. Also under the definition of vigilantism, vigilantes have to be working for the preservation and betterment of the existing system; what this means is that if a vigilante group acts outside of the laws and rules of the community which they represent, the community reserves the right to remove these vigilantes from power; thus, since the KKK was not working for the betterment of the system, they cannot be vigilantes. 3. While my opponent tries to make the claim that all vigilantes have to be violent, there's no way that could be true; if the government were to enforce the law, it would be called just; a change in the actor does not change the action, because since the government's failure temporarily empowers these vigilantes, they are able to use the same kinds of systematic force as the government; so, even if you buy into the argument that vigilantism is violent, keep in mind that the government also uses violence on occasion, but that doesn't make the government unjust. He goes on to talk about a case in Tennessee, where he talks about 'vigilantes' there, who burned down a man's house, etc. I'll respond in 2 ways. 1. When you weigh this through Communitarianism, you can see that the only time vigilantes have the authorization to act is when they act within community boundaries; in this case, 2 rogue individuals took what they thought was justice into their own hands; so, since the community did not authorize them to act, these individuals could not have been vigilantes. 2. Also keep in mind that the point of vigilantism is to take society's focus OFF of retribution; with a Communitarian model, we can move to things like Victim-Offender mediation, restitution, selective service, etc. Such systems have been implemented in Vermont, and have been quite effective in dealing with criminals; plus, the Communitarian model brings the victim and the community back in to the sentencing process; so, while government justice would be great, the government's failure was really an opportunity for the vigilantes to set up a model which the government could, at least partially, adapt to. Next, my opponent makes this rhetorically pleasing argument about 'breaking the law to protect the law'. I'll respond in two ways. 1. If the law was being broken, then community standards aren't being upheld, so this group of individuals would no longer be considered to be a vigilante group. 2. Since the government has failed to uphold the entire body of rules, even if the vigilante was acting 'illegally' in the eyes of the government, the government's concept of law has already failed, and if the vigilantes don't act to enforce the law, then no one else is going to; so, even if you buy into this argument that vigilantism is 'illegal', then you have to choose: either you have one violation of law to uphold the entire body of law, or you have multiple violations of law by real criminals who have noticed that there is no government intervention. You decide. My opponent then makes an argument about authorization and violence against criminals. Group these together, and I'll respond in two ways. 1. Using vigilantism doesn't mean championing violence as the answer to every problem, this is simply a scare tactic by my opponent; vigilantism may not be the cleanest option, or the 100% perfect option, but faced with a failing government, it's all we have left to achieve Justice. 2. As far as authorization is concerned, vigilantes are authorized in two ways: A) The main facilitator of justice, the government, has failed, meaning no one else can do the job. B) The community authorizes the vigilantes to act for the interests of the community (as per the definition of vigilantism, a community response). The "problems" with this situation: -not authorized (I just covered this) -violation of criminal justice (Pull through the fact that if the criminal justice system hasn't finished conducting its processes, then at that point the government has NOT failed, and thus makes this argument inapplicable.) -violates right to jury trial (1. Even the 'fair' trial can sometimes produce unjust results. 2. A trial results in punishment of prison and probation, but the commmunitarian/vigilante model removes punishment from the focus of criminal justice, instead focusing on actually mediating the conflict between the victim and the offender.) -no good understanding of law/do what they think is right (1. For the vigilantes to be operating, they have to be authorized by the community, meaning they have to have at least some understanding of community rules and regulations. 2. The vigilantes don't operate under their own mindset, because to be allowed to act at all, they have to be acting for the interests of the community, which is the reason that they are a legitimate group to begin with.) Also, I'd like to point out that my opponent very often says 'the vigilante', implying a single person; but, as I provided in my opening statement, vigilantism is a community-sanctioned group, and therefore we cannot consider rogue individuals in today's round. So, in conclusion, by removing the negative stigma from the term 'vigilantism', along with discarding the extreme and unrelated examples that my opponent presents, I see no other way to vote than PRO. I look forward to the final round of debate.