ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that government's use of imprisonment raises distinctive moral issues. The loss of freedom of movement involved in imprisonment interferes with the exercise of agency in a distinctive way. The loss of freedom of movement makes entire categories of human activity unavailable in a way that a financial penalty, even a large one, does not. Thus, imprisonment requires special justification, over and above the justification of punishment. The chapter examines the extent to which any of three most influential justifications of punishment—retribution, moral education, and deterrence—can overcome the moral presumption against involuntary confinement. The rational and moral duty to preserve one's all-purpose means explains the wrongness of most instances of kidnapping. Thus, on the Kantian view of morality, kidnapping others to advance one's interests is wrong. There are morally salient differences between kidnapping by private citizens and the imprisonment of accused and convicted criminals by the state.
