Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 3 of 3
Full-Text Articles in Law
Of Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman, And Legal Expressivism: Why Massachusetts Should Stand Its Ground On "Stand Your Ground", Louis N. Schulze Jr.
Of Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman, And Legal Expressivism: Why Massachusetts Should Stand Its Ground On "Stand Your Ground", Louis N. Schulze Jr.
Faculty Publications
This essay suggests that the expressive impact of Stand Your Ground laws alters the shared norms governing our collective understanding of the moral limits of “self-defense.” The essay argues that the theory of Legal Expressivism can explain the widespread misunderstanding of the limits of self-defense, as demonstrated by the institutional and popular reactions to the killing of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman. To support this thesis, the piece briefly explains Stand Your Ground statutes and legal expressivism. It then details the nature of the expressive function of these statutes and asserts that Massachusetts, which recently considered the adoption of such …
Nothing Is Not Enough: Fix The Absurd Post-Booker Federal Sentencing System, Frank O. Bowman Iii
Nothing Is Not Enough: Fix The Absurd Post-Booker Federal Sentencing System, Frank O. Bowman Iii
Faculty Publications
This article is an elaboration of testimony I gave in February 2012 at a U.S. Sentencing Commission hearing considering whether the advisory guidelines system created by the Supreme Court’s 2005 decision in United States v. Booker should be modified or replaced. I argue that it should.
Against Theories Of Punishment: The Thought Of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Marc O. Degirolami
Against Theories Of Punishment: The Thought Of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Marc O. Degirolami
Faculty Publications
This paper reflects critically on what is the near-universal contemporary method of conceptualizing the tasks of the scholar of criminal punishment. It does so by the unusual route of considering the thought of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, a towering figure in English law and political theory, one of its foremost historians of criminal law, and a prominent public intellectual of the late Victorian period. Notwithstanding Stephen's stature, there has as yet been no sustained effort to understand his views of criminal punishment. This article attempts to remedy this deficit. But its aims are not exclusively historical. Indeed, understanding Stephen's ideas …