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Articles 1 - 13 of 13

Full-Text Articles in Jurisprudence

Separating Contract And Promise, Aditi Bagchi Sep 2007

Separating Contract And Promise, Aditi Bagchi

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Contract has been conceptualized as a species of promise. Treating contractual promise as a kind of promise highlights certain important aspects of contracting, but it also obscures essential differences between legally binding and everyday, or what I will call “private,” promises. The moral character of a private promise depends on the fact that it is not only freely made but also freely kept. Most contractual promises are not intended to have and (by definition) do not have this voluntary character. A promisor essentially opts out of the private practice of promising when she assigns to a third party the authority …


Distributive Injustice And Private Law, Aditi Bagchi Sep 2007

Distributive Injustice And Private Law, Aditi Bagchi

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Imperfect rights are not held against any single person, and when violated, they do not ground a claim for any particular quantum of redress. The right to an adequate income may be an imperfect right. Because imperfect rights have been asserted only as claims against the state, and because they do not lend themselves to constitutional adjudication, they have had little traction. In my paper, I will emphasize that any claim on the state is derivative from the right held as against other citizens. Even those who believe that individuals have perfect social rights against the state should concede an …


Well-Being, Inequality And Time: The Time-Slice Problem And Its Policy Implications, Matthew D. Adler Aug 2007

Well-Being, Inequality And Time: The Time-Slice Problem And Its Policy Implications, Matthew D. Adler

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Should equality be viewed from a lifetime or “sublifetime” perspective? In measuring the inequality of income, for example, should we measure the inequality of lifetime income or of annual income? In characterizing a tax as “progressive” or “regressive,” should we look to whether the annual tax burden increases with annual income, or instead to whether the lifetime tax burden increases with lifetime income? Should the overriding aim of anti-poverty programs be to reduce chronic poverty: being badly off for many years, because of low human capital or other long-run factors? Or is the moral claim of the impoverished person a …


Of Equal Wrongs And Half Rights, Gideon Parchomovsky, Peter Siegelman, Steven Thel Jun 2007

Of Equal Wrongs And Half Rights, Gideon Parchomovsky, Peter Siegelman, Steven Thel

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With a tiny handful of exceptions, common law jurisprudence is predicated on a “winner-take-all” principle: the plaintiff either gets the entire entitlement at issue or collects nothing at all. Cases that split an entitlement between the two parties are exceedingly rare. While there may be sound reasons for this all-or-nothing rule, we argue in this Article that the law should prefer equal division of an entitlement in a limited but important set of property, tort and contracts cases. The common element in such cases is a windfall, a gain or loss that occurs despite the fact that no ex ante …


The Role Of Moral Philosophers In The Competition Between Deontological And Empirical Desert, Paul H. Robinson Apr 2007

The Role Of Moral Philosophers In The Competition Between Deontological And Empirical Desert, Paul H. Robinson

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Desert appears to be in ascendence as a distributive principle for criminal liability and punishment but there is confusion as to whether it is a deontological or an empirical conception of desert that is or should be promoted. Each offers a distinct advantage over the other. Deontological desert can transcend community, situation, and time to give a conception of justice that can be relied upon to reveal errors in popular notions of justice. On the other hand, empirical desert can be more easily operationalized than can deontological desert because, contrary to common wisdom, there is a good deal of agreement …


The Non-Problem Of Free Will In Forensic Psychiatry And Psychology, Stephen J. Morse Mar 2007

The Non-Problem Of Free Will In Forensic Psychiatry And Psychology, Stephen J. Morse

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This article demonstrates that there is no free will problem in forensic psychiatry by showing that free will or its lack is not a criterion for any legal doctrine and it is not an underlying general foundation for legal responsibility doctrines and practices. There is a genuine metaphysical free will problem, but the article explains why it is not relevant to forensic practice. Forensic practitioners are urged to avoid all usage of free will in their forensic thinking and work product because it is irrelevant and spawns confusion.


Forgiveness In Criminal Procedure, Stephanos Bibas Jan 2007

Forgiveness In Criminal Procedure, Stephanos Bibas

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Though forgiveness and mercy matter greatly in social life, they play fairly small roles in criminal procedure. Criminal procedure is dominated by the state, whose interests in deterring, incapacitating, and inflicting retribution leave little room for mercy. An alternative system, however, would focus more on the needs of human participants. Victim-offender mediation, sentencing discounts, and other mechanisms could encourage offenders to express remorse, victims to forgive, and communities to reintegrate and employ offenders. All of these actors could then better heal, reconcile, and get on with their lives. Forgiveness and mercy are not panaceas: not all offenders and victims would …


On The Moral Structure Of White-Collar Crime, Mitchell N. Berman Jan 2007

On The Moral Structure Of White-Collar Crime, Mitchell N. Berman

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No abstract provided.


Challenges In Law Making In Mass Societies, Geoffrey C. Hazard Jr. Jan 2007

Challenges In Law Making In Mass Societies, Geoffrey C. Hazard Jr.

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No abstract provided.


Bush V. Gore And The Uses Of 'Limiting', Chad Flanders Jan 2007

Bush V. Gore And The Uses Of 'Limiting', Chad Flanders

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My comment looks at the debate in the 6th Circuit case Stewart v. Blackwell in light of the history of the use of "limiting language" by the Supreme Court. I catalog the Court's past uses of limiting language, and distinguish between the Court's several uses of limiting language. Against those who defend the limiting language of Bush v. Gore as simply an example of innocuous minimalism, I report my findings that "limiting" is always used by the Court to nullify a principle that decided a previous case. Additionally, the Court has never, prior to Bush, used limiting language to limit …


The Rhetoric Of Anti-Relativism In A Culture Of Certainty, Howard Lesnick Jan 2007

The Rhetoric Of Anti-Relativism In A Culture Of Certainty, Howard Lesnick

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No abstract provided.


Criminalization Of Corporate Law: The Impact On Shareholders And Other Constituents, Jill E. Fisch Jan 2007

Criminalization Of Corporate Law: The Impact On Shareholders And Other Constituents, Jill E. Fisch

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No abstract provided.


Judicial Activism And Its Critics, Kermit Roosevelt Iii, Richard Garnett Jan 2007

Judicial Activism And Its Critics, Kermit Roosevelt Iii, Richard Garnett

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No abstract provided.