I'M not so sure about justice in America for a lot of reasons. And when it comes to this thing about a jury of one's peers, I get real troubled thinking about the parent who smacks their kid upside the head like used to happen all across the country and on a daily basis.

Back then, a smack upside the head or that back-hand lick the old-timers were famous for dishing out was not classified as child abuse, nor was it a reportable offense that could wind up sending this corrector of a kid's wrong deed to the hoosegow.

The idea of arresting parents for their minor child's criminal act drew so much commentary when I recently made that proclamation it made me wonder what would cause me to put that "outrageous," as some called it, viewpoint into print.

Actually, the majority of those who spoke to the issue said, "Right on," and most of them provided their own commentary regarding how out of control children are in today's permissive American society.

The lady with the flowing shoulder-length white hair in the Altadena nail salon said her parents wasted no time laying down the rules and daring her to even consider breaking them. The backhand was something she knew all about! She said when she had kids of her own, they didn't mess with her and she went on to talk about being called strict. Her kids and her grandkids she proclaimed to be productive members of our society.

A jury of one's peers, in the `40s, when I was growing up, would have let my parents and all the others who were enforcing household rules with a heavy hand, walk free out of the courtroom with the foreman giving a congratulatory comment to news reporters covering the case who had from all across the country.

Their readers would be exclaiming it was pure nonsense for parents to be arrested for simply doing their job. Some might even have called the trial outrageous.

Once upon a time, parents had a responsibility and they met that challenge and their offspring are proud today of their upbringing and many are wondering what's gone so terribly wrong.

But let's get back to the year 2009 and my call to arrest irresponsible parents of minor children who commit horrific crimes as the one I described in my recent column about a teenager being set on fire by a group of teens whose ringleader had just been picked up by his parents at the police station the day before this brutal incident.

In today's climate there would probably be no difficulty in finding a jury of irresponsible parent peers who would let these folk walk.

But for the parent hauled into court for using a heavy hand to rule the roost, I'm not so sure that when potential jurors got questioned about their own discipline practices, they could say, in this child-centered and permissive society, that spare the rod and spoil the child was the philosophy they believed in.

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