When do you give another chance?
It's a tough question. It's easy for me (or anyone else) to say "give another chance" when it is someone else who is going to take the risk of another failure. It's a lot harder when you are the one taking the risk.
If I were in the Packers' shoes, I expect I'd bring him in to camp and allow him to compete for a roster spot. But that's me -- partly because I know it took me well into my 40s before I started to have a clue -- in many ways I could have gone down the route of a Jolly or a Ryan Leaf or innumerable other screw-ups; I simply never got caught at the things that would have sent me to jail and expose me to public scrutiny.
And because the reality is that "straightening up" requires commitment by more than one person. For Johnny Jolly to "grow up" or "figure things out" -- obviously that's a necessary condition. If he doesn't get his head on straight, he's going to fall down again. But while his own "change" is a necessary condition, it isn't a sufficient one. If he's to improve the rest of his life someone is going to have to "take a chance on him." Someone is going to have to be willing to say "I know he's been a screwup for years, but I think he's turned the corner, etc."
But all that said, I'm not going to rag on the Packers if they decide to say, "sorry, but you've used up all your chances here." Because the risk of relapse is real and significant. If you're an addict, you're always going to be more susceptible to certain kinds of temptations. And you're always going to be a bigger risk to those who agree to deal with you.
IMO there are no easy rules for the Packers (or any employer) to apply in these kind of cases. IMO a moral decision-maker must consider each case individually. And IMO regardless which particular individual decisions are made, some of them are going to be wrong. Sometimes an extra chance is given and is followed by disappointment. Sometimes one fails to give a chance that would have made the difference.
As a teacher, every semester I have to make several "give another chance?" choices. What do I do if student X misses without excuse? What if he misses an exam worth 20% of the grade? What if he misses the exam, and fails to turn in multiple assignments on time? What if he does all of these things, and then, a week before the final, asks for an incomplete because of an inability to complete a major project?
Earlier in my career I took the approach of the strict constructionist lawyer. I simply went by what the syllabus specified. I essentially said, "These are the rules. You knew what they were. Now you have to bear the consequences of your choice." After a while, I found that I had somehow swung to the opposite end of the pendulum, when I was pretty much allowing "another chance" every time. Eventually, though, I realized that there's nothing you can do to avoid screwing it up from time to time. There was that student in my second semester of teaching I gave a D (because that's what the syllabus said was earned) that I should have "arbitrarily" adjusted upward to a C+. There was that other student in year 10 who I should have given a D to, but because of my "extra chances"/"adjustments", ended up getting a B-.
So now, while the syllabus once again says I'm strictly going to follow it's rules, I don't actually have a hard rule against "adjustments" -- I treat each case as unique.
And I rarely worry about "setting a precedent."
/enter boring teacher mode
If you look at the longer history of the Anglo-American legal system (i.e., before the last 25-50 years, when everything has gotten muddled and out of whack), you'll find a distinction between actions "at law" and actions "at equity." Law cases were decided based upon interpretation of existing "rules of law." Some of these rules came from statutory enactment; a lot more of them came by virtue of rulings in prior law cases ("precedents"). So when he were sitting in law, the judge not only had to make sure he applied the law correctly to the current case's facts, he had to keep half an eye on what his decision might portend for future cases,
(This is also why, if you've ever read/seen how Supreme Court justices question the lawyers on appeal, you'll see a lot of questions that deal with hypothetical facts not actually involved in the case being appealed. The justices are thinking about what the case will yield down the line in another case(s).
Equity, however, doesn't have this same kind of precedent value. (Or at least it didn't use to.) Equity decisions were decided solely on the facts of the case at hand. The finding was determined according to "common principles of equity, justice, and fairness," not according to the rules of law.
Today, of course, we no longer care much about the distinction, save in battles between lawyers about the proper instructions to be given to a jury. Historically, there was no right to a jury decision of a matter of equity -- those "common principles" were always decided by a judge. Today, however, we try to reduce equity and fairness to rules of law; and we see all trials not as "applying the law", but as deciding matters of justice.
Indeed, I expect that were I today to make the claim that "courts are not about ensuring justice", I'd get derided just about everywhere. (Even though for most of our nation's history, America's courts, like the English common law and equity courts they combined, reserved findings of "justice" for cases in equity, and satisfied themselves with the application of the existing laws of contract, property, tort, and crime.)
IMO this transformation of courts from being primarily places of "law" into places primarily of "justice" may be the single greatest problem with modern American jurisprudence. Without it, the activist Supreme Courts that conservatives have railed against for 50+ years would never have been possible. Without it, we would be less a nation of legalists, less susceptible to the pettifogging of lawyers and "thought leaders" and know-nothing protectors-of-our-interests. Without it, we would still have our William Brennans and our Thurgood Marshalls and our David Souters and Antonin Scalias and our William Howard Tafts. But a political hack like Sonia Sotomayer would never have passed muster.
/exit boring teacher mode
Why the extended digression? Because, to me, "second chances" are more like "equity" than they are like "law." When we're a judge/jury confronted with a Johnny Jolly who comes before us having been caught with an illegal amount of something, we ought to apply the law relating to that possession. And we should do so whether we think the law sucks or not. Save in extreme cases (judicial review; jury nullification) it is not our job as judge/jury to make the law, only to apply it.
But when we're an individual employer or customer or neighbor dealing with a Johnny Jolly asking for a second chance, we ought to be controlled by our personal sense of equity and fairness.
Personal relationships should be governed by the moral characters of those in the relationship, shaped by general principles of equity and fairness. Only when those relationships break down (divorce, breach of contract, etc.) should a "law (and precedent)" way of thinking get involved.
And that means that, while I am happy to say what *I* would do in this particular situation, I shouldn't judge or complain if Thompson, McCarthy, et al decide on another approach. Those who know the most about the situation, those who are going to bear the costs of the wrong decision, should be the one's deciding.
A decision based in equity, which IMO this is, needs a lot more information about facts than I will ever have.
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)