The Private, the Public, & Legitimate Violence

Two things struck me about Measure For Measure. The first is that the words “public” and “private” are used several times throughout the course of the play, like in 5.1.72 when Lucio says “I think if you handled her privately, she would sooner confess; perchance publicly she’ll be ashamed,” in 4.6.26 when Angelo’s use of the word “particular” actually means “private,” and in 5.1.452 when the Provost says “It was by private message.” Each time “public” is used it is referring to Antonio’s position of power both as a man and as a member of the state: his decree that Claudio should be executed, his well known precision, his “unsoiled name”, and his position as lawful leader of Vienna in the absence of the Duke are all “public.” “Private,” however, is used when referring to the women — Isabella and Mariana – and Antonio’s dealings with them. Angelo's promise to Isabella to spare her brother is made in the private, so he doesn’t actually have to keep it; Isabella and Mariana are accused of hatching a plan to destroy Angelo's reputation in the “private” with the friar; Angelo's sexual acts with Isabella/Mariana are also in the private as there is no scene of the encounter (which I was anticipating, probably because of our previous reading of Lucrece.) The Duke operates in both spheres (as himself in the public and as a friar in the private,) so he is able to subvert and reverse the power relations of the two, making what is done in the private supersede what is declared in the public. (Or maybe he simply makes the private public?) All Isabella’s and Marianna’s actions take place in the private: all the characters who interact with them have to enter the private (like when Lucio went to see Isabella at the convent) except for in scene five when the Duke, who permeates both worlds, manipulates them and brings them into the public.
The second is the way in which the play functions as a kind of microcosm of how the state employs its legitimate use of violence to police its subjects. As a document of the early modern era it foreshadows the ways in which violence is legally and legitimately used by governments in the modern era operating within the nation-state paradigm. Just as later 20th century governments could exercise violence over their own subjects (policing) and against other nation-states (war) Angelo and the Duke are allowed to execute criminals. There is nothing that determines when then can and cannot execute people, they can just do it whenever they deem it necessary. No one questions the legitimacy of their actions: Claudio’s punishment is rejected not because it is an execution in and of itself, but because it seems too severe, and ultimately because it is hypocritical of Angelo. I can’t help but ask if Angelo hadn’t lusted after Isabella, if he remained precise, would the execution have gone through? This is very different from today, where the very existence of the term “cruel and unusual punishment” shows a radical shift in the perception of how much power the state should be allowed to have and how it can or cannot use that power. The most interesting thing, though, was that the head of the state, the Duke, starts to question the legitimacy himself, and starts to base legitimacy not on law, but on morality. Claudio’s execution is wrong not because it is against the law, but because it is immoral. This is being mirrored in today's society in the way that WWII is called a "just war." It's justness (legitimacy) comes from morality. The same argument could be made for the war on terrorism (though not by me.)