Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Digital Commons Network

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

PDF

Scholarly Works

Courts

1995

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Entire DC Network

Positivism And Antipositivism In Federal Courts Law, Michael Wells Apr 1995

Positivism And Antipositivism In Federal Courts Law, Michael Wells

Scholarly Works

What is the proper role of rules in federal courts law? Some scholars associated with the Legal Process assert that rules are unimportant here. They believe that the values of principled adjudication and reasoned elaboration should take precedence over the making and application of rules. The area is, in the jargon of jurisprudence, "antipositivist." Others maintain that rules do, or at any rate should, count heavily in federal courts' decisionmaking. In this Article, I argue that Legal Process scholars are right to spurn formalism in most parts of federal courts law. But the Legal Process model of federal courts law …


Busting The Hart & Wechsler Paradigm, Michael L. Wells Jan 1995

Busting The Hart & Wechsler Paradigm, Michael L. Wells

Scholarly Works

Federal Courts law was once a vibrant area of scholarship and an essential course for intellectually ambitious students. Now its prestige has diminished so much that scholars debate its future in a recent issue of the Vanderbilt Law Review, where even one of its champions calls it (albeit in the subjunctive mood) a “scholarly backwater.” What, if anything, went wrong, and what should Federal Courts scholars do about it? In his contribution to the Vanderbilt symposium, Richard Fallon defends the reigning model of Federal Courts law, an approach to jurisdictional issues that dates from the publication in 1953 of Henry …