Law Commons^™

The Cultural Defense: Reflections In Light Of The Model Penal Code And The Religious Freedom Restoration Act, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

I wrote this essay after participating in a 2006 workshop on Criminal Law and Cultural Diversity, which discussed, among other subjects, the wisdom of providing a "cultural defense." Uncertain just how far such a defense might expand on defenses already available, I undertook to explore that topic.

The phrase "a cultural defense" suggests an either/or choice that any legal system might make. That matters are much more complex than this is part of the burden of this essay. A "cultural defense" in its most general sense refers to a wide range of ways in which evidence about a defendant's cultural …

A Vice Of Its Virtues: The Perils Of Precision In Criminal Codification, As Illustrated By Retreat, General Justification, And Dangerous Utterances, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

My subject, the problem of precision in criminal codes, is hardly novel. Greater precision has been a major aim of systematic codification, which can specify what behavior is criminal in a way that is more rational, coordinated, and exact than would be possible if liability were determined by occasional statutory enactment, by common-law development, or by a combination of occasional statutes and judicial development. Under this last approach, which was typical in the United States prior to the Model Penal Code, statutes loosely set out the list of offenses and their penalties; critical elements of offenses and many defenses of …

Mistake In The Model Penal Code: A False False Problem, George P. Fletcher

Faculty Scholarship

No solution seems more gratifying to the modern theorist than to claim that an apparently serious problem is not really a problem at all. By branding nonfalsifiable propositions as nonsense, the Vienna circle of logical positivists discovered that the metaphysical concerns of others were really false problems. By ridding philosophy of false problems, Wittgenstein thought that he could let the fly escape from the bottle; he could release the philosophical spirit from its confounding constraints. Brainerd Currie brought this method to the law with his justly famous theory of false conflicts in the conflicts of laws. There was no need …

Reflections On Felony-Murder, George P. Fletcher

Faculty Scholarship

Of all the reforms proposed by the Model Penal Code, perhaps none has been less influential than the Model Code's recommendation on the perennial problem of felony-murder. As found in our nineteenth-century criminal codes, the rule has several variations. The basic scheme is to hold the accused liable for murder if the killing is connected in any way with the attempt to commit a felony or the flight from the scene of a felony. It does not matter whether the accused or an accomplice causes the death. Nor does it matter whether the killing occurs accidentally and non-negligently. According to …

The Individualization Of Excusing Conditions, George P. Fletcher

Faculty Scholarship

The excusing conditions of the criminal law are variations of the theme "I couldn't help myself' or "I didn't mean to do it." In this respect the defenses known as necessity, duress, insanity and mistake of law are but extensions of homely, routine apologies for causing harm and violating the rules of social and family life. While we use the plea "I couldn't help myself" to cover the full range of excusing circumstances, each of the formal excuses of the criminal law has a limited sphere. As a general matter, these spheres are dictated by the type of circumstances rendering …

Two Kinds Of Legal Rules: A Comparative Study Of Burden-Of-Persuasion Practices In Criminal Cases, George P. Fletcher

Faculty Scholarship

Good men everywhere praise the presumption of innocence. And be they Frenchmen, Germans, or Americans, they agree on the demand of the presumption in practice. Both here and abroad, the state's invocation of criminal sanctions demands a high degree of proof that the accused has committed the offense charged. To express the requisite standard of proof, common lawyers speak of the prosecutor's duty to prove his case beyond a reasonable doubt. And Continental lawyers invoke the maxim in dubio pro reo – a precept requiring triers of fact to acquit in cases of doubt.

The French speak of the presomption …