Non-Judges and the Rule of Law

Reader Stephen Carney asks the following excellent questions:

How do/should Catholic legal scholars compare the role of a judge with the role of other state actors, such as police or prison guards? A lone cop can't just go arrest an abortionist for murder, because the larger system tells him, "no, for now that's a legal act." A prison guard can't unilaterally release someone that he thinks is innocent, can he? What about on death row?

And if we can accept that cops and prison guards can have limits on their roles -- albeit limits that may give way in extreme situations (orders to round up the Jews, etc.) -- then why can we not accept analogous, though different, limits on judges?  Thus, a Catholic judge perhaps should oppose Roe, leaving it to States, but should not declare the death penalty unconstitutional (unless the case can truly be made for that on constitutional terms), as that's not his job, any more than it's the prison guard's job to sneak prisoners out.

I tentatively agree that a Catholic judge faces similar professional obligations as others. If she can't perform the tasks called for, she must either work to change the legal regime through the established procedures, engage in a form of civil disobedience (open disobedience and a willingness to suffer the consequences), recuse herself if called to perform intolerable tasks (leaving to the side what those might be), or resign.  The prison guard can seek to alleviate unjust conditions through a partial remedy (e.g., treating the prisoners humanely), engage in civil disobedience (e.g., a sit-down strike), work to change the system from within, or resign.  Subject perhaps to certain extreme cases where the legal order is irredeemably corrupted (Nazi Germany comes to mind), the guard cannot "do justice" by subverting the legal order.  Do other readers/co-bloggers have a different perspective?

Rob