The answer must be: ‘because we choose not to under any circumstances’. Otherwise we are only haggling over the price, but not the principle. The real problem must be how to preserve the principle or else the whole debate is really about seemingness and appearances [...] If evil is the price of God, then Ivan doesn’t want God; similarly, if BHO means what he says, then if torture is the cost of saving a city, even his child was in that city, then he should not save the city. That was Jeff Jacoby’s argument, and it’s a good one. In fact, I kinda like it myself. But the hitch is practicality.

The hitch is not practicality. The hitch is that not all principles are moral; not all principles are equally moral.

Not all principles are moral. The Nazis had strong principles, and were even willing to sacrifice their national survival to protect one of them. That one was the destruction of every Jew within reach. That policy cost them a great deal of productive capacity, and may have shortened WWII by several years.

Not all principles are equally moral. Some hew closely to fundamental virtues; others apply those virtues in certain circumstances but not in others. My favorite examples are consideration and courtesy. Being considerate means looking out for the needs, wishes, and desires of others and not putting yourself first. Being courteous means following certain conventions of communication and action. One can use courtesy to be very rude indeed. (See Miss Manners’s Guide for some excellent examples.) Consideration, then, applies the cardinal virtue of Justice and sometimes the virtue of Charity. Courtesy may do that, and it may make things more pleasant, but it may also be use for other purposes.

It is not enough to be principled. Those principles must stand up to a serious moral analysis. Letting an evil man or movement have his/its way because you are not willing to use violent or forcible means to resist it does not stand up to serious moral analysis. Limited torture whose purpose is to get information to prevent an atrocity is different from the kind of torture practiced by the North Vietnamese on American POWs, which was unlimited and so wholly uninformed about what it was trying to find out that it would be a farce were it not for the seriousness of the harm. That torture was, of itself, an atrocity. Putting the fear of death into someone who is trying to commit, advance, or protect an future atrocity is not.