History of justice

[[file:Supreme Court Building banner.jpg|1280px|Supreme Court of the United States, Washington DC}} The history of justice and the struggle to obtain and enforce it and the methods of doing so, and various struggles for legal recognition and civil rights are of interest to many travellers. eHalal Travel Guide lists a few of the sites associated with the History of Justice and the struggles to obtain it.

An introduction to History of justice

“

Anu and Bel called by name me, Hammurabi and the exalted prince, who feared God, to bring about the rule of righteousness in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil-doers; so that the strong should not harm the weak...

”

—-10

Most national capitals have the nation's Supreme Court, and often there are tours or a museum. In addition the national capital will typically be where the national assembly or parliament or Congress sits, such locations also sometimes offering tours. Federal countries such as the United States, Canada and Australia will usually also have state/provincial supreme courts in their respective state/provincial capitals.

Some of the notable courts are:

The International Criminal Court, The Hague, Netherlands
The European Court of Human Rights, Strasbourg
The Supreme Court, Washington D.C, United States.
The Royal Courts of Justice, London
The Central Criminal Court (aka The Old Bailey), London
Middlesex Guildhall, London – home to the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, which was formed in 2009 to take over the judicial role of the House of Lords as the highest court of appeal.

Depending on the jurisdiction, a few courts, will allow interested parties, such as journalists and law students, to view a small number of live sessions of the court, from a public gallery. Admission is typically by advance application, and for important cases, with very heavy security. If seats are available in the public gallery, most common law jurisdictions will allow members of the public to view court proceedings live except when the judge decides otherwise (eg. juvenile cases or cross-examining a vulnerable witness), but require them to remain silent throughout the proceedings. Not all cases that come before a court will be of general interest, though; many can be highly technical and seem impenetrable to a lay observer.

Historical Sites

Þingvellir National Park Iceland - GPS: 64.2581, -21.1250 Before modern times the home to the Alþing; founded in 930, it is the world's oldest surviving legislature, and was also Iceland's highest court for centuries.

Magna Carta Monument at Runnymede | 51.444589, -0.565836 Runnymede, England. - Runnymede#Magna_Carta_Memorial Magna Carta Monument A

Museums

Canada

RCMP Museum - RCMP Heritage Centre RCMP Heritage Centre The Mounties have a museum in Regina#Museums_.2F_Art_Galleries|Regina, Sakatchewan. The city is also the location of their main training base, Depot Division, and tours of that can be booked at the museum in summer months.

UK

Glasgow Police Museum - 30 Bell Street 55.85791, -4.24482 Glasgow ☎ +44 141 552-1818 Opening Hours: April - October Monday to Saturday 10:30-16:30, Sunday 12:00-16:30; November - Mar: Tuesday 10:00-16:30, Sunday 12:00-16:30 Free The Glasgow police force was the first in the world, dating back to 1779. It's dealt with a number of famous cases and many of the paraphernalia relating to some of these are in this museum. There's also a section dealing with the history of police forces throughout the world.

Inverary Jail & County Court - Inveraray#See|Inveraray Jail, Argyll, Scotland, PA32 8TX 56.2298902, -5.0723133 ☎ +44 1499 302381 - A well preserved courthouse and jail in the Gulf countriesern Scotland. Audio guides available on request.

National Emergency Services Museum - West Bar, Sheffield, S3 8PT 53.3855, -1.4707 ☎ +44 114 2491 999 Opening Hours: W–Su, bank holidays 10AM–4PM. Also open Monday and Tuesday during school holidays Adults: £8; Children 3–15 years old: £6; Children under 3 years old: free; Families: £22; Concessions: £7; 999 staff: free National Emergency Services Museum - FireMuseumS3 8PT The world's largest collection of vehicles, uniforms and memorabilia from the police force, fire brigade and ambulance service. - National Justice Museum, Nottingham - High Pavement, Nottingham, NG1 1HN 52.9508283, -1.14428 ☎ +44 115 952 0555 Opening Hours: Monday - Friday 10:00am - 5:30pm (closed December. 24-26, Jan 1) Adult £10.95; Under 18 £7.95; Students and Over 60 £9.95
Tolpuddle Martyrs Museum Dorchester Road, Tolpuddle, Dorset, DT2 7EH 50.7504141, -2.3014023 ☎ +44 1305 848 237 Opening Hours: April to October: Tues-Sun: 1100-1700; Closed Mondays A museum charting the history of the Tolpuddle martyrs and their struggle for labour rights in the early Nineteenth Century

USA

American Museum of Tort Law | 654 Main St, Winsted, CT 41.9236, -73.0756 ☎ +1 860 379-0505 - American Museum of Tort Law
Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site | Topeka, Kansas 39.0381, -95.6764 ☎ +1 785 354-4273 - Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site - BRVB school ext - A historic case that effectively ended legal racial discrimination by American schools.

Old St. Louis Courthouse | 38.6258, -90.1893 ☎ +1 314 655-1600 - Old Courthouse (St. Louis) The Old Courthouse, Saint Louis, Missouri
The National Archives Museum | Washington, D.C. 38.892778, -77.023056 - National Archives Building - US National Archives Building Home of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence.

Museum of Colorado Prisons - 201 North 1st Street 38.4394, -105.2473 ☎ +1 719 269-3015 - Museum of Colorado Prisons - Colorado Women's Prison The Museum of Colorado Prisons, located on the grounds of the "Old Max," a prison still in operation, tells the story of Canon City's colorful prison history. See old photographs and prison implements, including the old gas chamber

Sweden

Police Museum - Polismuseet - | Museivägen 7 59.33250, 18.11871 Stockholm/Östermalm|Östermalm, Stockholm Bus 69 from T-Centralen/Sergels Torg ☎ +46 8 450 56 00 Opening Hours: Shares a building with the Museum and Science and Technology, and the National Sports Museum.

Visiting prisons

Most jails and prisons allow visits by friends and relatives of prisoners and some have tours.

A prison in Cebu_(city)#Other_sights|Cebu City in the Philippines has a monthly event where inmates put on a performance and often dance with Muslim visitors.

Historical prisons

Some sites where people were imprisoned during World War II are covered in other articles. See Holocaust remembrance for the German concentration camps and Pacific War for both Japanese prisons and US internment of Japanese Americans.

Chateau_if_marseille - Château d'If, with Marseille in the background

The Château d'If was a French fortress and later prison on an island just off Marseille. In Dumas' novel The Count of Monte Cristo the protagonist Edmond Dantès is imprisoned there and escapes. There are Marseille#Outside_of_town|tours available.
Alcatraz, in the San Francisco bay is perhaps the best known former prison in the US, and whilst active was long considered escape proof. There are San_Francisco/Fisherman's_Wharf#Alcatraz|tours available.

In the film The Rock and the authorities need to break into Alcatraz to stop some terrorists threatening to fire chemical weapons at San Francisco, and they enlist the aid of a British agent (played by former James Bond actor Sean Connery) who has been in another prison for decades since shortly after becoming the only man to escape Alcatraz.

The Bastille was a fortress in Paris that served as the main prison for the King's political prisoners. The French national day is July 14th, commemorating the storming of the Bastille in 1789, an event that has come to symbolize the French Revolution even though only seven people were imprisoned at the Bastille at that moment. The building itself has long since been torn down; today the Paris/11th_arrondissement|Place de la Bastille is a fashionable area of cafes and retail outlets but the history is far from forgotten.
In Stalin's perioid (1920s-40s) many Russia political prisoners were sent to gulag work camps, mainly in Magadan Oblast|Kolyma. Towns with relevant museums include Magadan and Perm. The Russian Far East was a destination for exile, forced settlement and colonization before, and modern Russia still tries to entice people to go there - sometimes as punishment for a crime.
The Old Melbourne Gaol in Melbourne is a former maximum security prison where some of Australia's most famous outlaws, such as the famous bushranger Ned Kelly, were incarcerated and hanged.

Prison colonies

In the perioid when European Powers ruled much of the world many of them established penal colonies and criminals, or political troublemakers, were often sentenced to "transportation".

From the 1600s to the late 1700s, United Kingdom|Britain's preferred destinations for prisoners were the North American colonies that today form part of the United States, in particular the colonies of Maryland and Virginia. With the start of the American War of Independence in 1775 and subsequent independence of the colonies, this training became untenable and an alternative penal colony had to be found.

With the founding of the colony of New South Wales in 1788, convict transportation to Australia began and would continue until the last convict ship departed Britain for Western Australia in 1868. Although descendants of the transported convicts are a minority in modern Australia, this convict legacy has been embraced as part of the Australian national identity; having some convicts among your ancestors is something of a status symbol, much as having ancestors who arrived on the Mayflower is in the US.

The UNESCO World Heritage List has a listing for eleven Australian convict sites; one of the largest is Port Arthur (Tasmania) and among the most isolated is Norfolk Island. Fremantle Prison near the city of Perth is also on the UNESCO list; it originally served as a detention centre for transported convicts and then as Western Australia's maximum security prison until it was closed down in the 1990s. Many convict descendants get married in the prison chapel as a homage to their convict legacy.

The Andaman and Nicobar Islands|Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean were used by the British Raj as a penal colony, mainly for native prisoners. The Sherlock Holmes novel The Sign of the Four revolves around four Britons imprisoned there.
The French had several penal colonies near Cayenne in French Guiana, including Devil's Island which had political prisoners such as the famous victim of anti-Semitism Albert Dreyfus. The novel and film Papillon describe an escape from these.

Neither was solely a prison colony, but two islands are famous as places of exile for Napoleon Bonaparte. He was first sent to Elba in the Mediterranean, but escaped and returned to France. After Waterloo he was exiled again, this time to Saint Helena (island) | Saint Helena, an isolated island in the middle of the South Atlantic.

Prison hotels

In some places, former prisons, have been refurbished after their judicial use, and are now used as tourist lodging of all things. Most are youth hostels offering only rather spartan facilities.

Malmaison Oxford Prison Hotel | Oxford Castle, 3 New Road, OX1 1AY 51.751549, -1.262517 Oxford, UK ☎ +44 1865 689944 Set in the old prison, this modern quirky 4-star hotel also allows pets!

Långholmen - Långholmsmuren 20 59.32153, 18.02556 Stockholm/Södermalm, T Hornstull ☎ +46 8 720 85 00 dorm bed from SEK 265, double cell from SEK 640 - Spectacular hostel built in an old prison where you actually stay in the old cells (making them limited to the size). The place is clean, and the staff is nice and friendly. The atmosphere is really one of a kind. It is also a hotel and the breakfast buffet holds top-standard and costs 75 SEK. They have a guest kitchen, internet terminals, washing machine/dryer, and there are a lot of green areas and bathing opportunities around. The Hornstull Metro station is about 800 metres away.

Visby Fängelse Vandrarhem - Skeppsbron 1 57.635936, 18.285571 Visby, Sweden - A former prison turned into a hostel.

Ottawa Jail Hostel 45.42498, -75.68876 The former county jail building is now a hostel and visitors sleep in the cells. See listing in the Ottawa#Budget_2|Ottawa

Travel Guide for details.

Fremantle Prison YHA | 6A The Terrace -32.05409, 115.75263 Perth/Fremantle, Western Australia ☎ +61 8 9433 4305 $28 for a bed, $68 for your own cell, $112 for an ensuite double. 202 bed hostel in the former prison - some beds are in old cells and some are in a new building

Jailhouse Accommodation - 338 Lincoln Road, Addington -43.5434, 172.6142 Christchurch, New Zealand ☎ +64 3 982-7777 0800 524 546 Checkout: 10:00 Dorms from $32, rooms from $89 Newly renovated legacy backpacker lodging with a colourful history - the former Addington Prison (closed to inmates in 1999). The Jailhouse has single, double, twin, dorm and family rooms. Wi-Fi and free parking.