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The Legal Presumption Of Reason: Noble Truth, Useful Fiction, Ignoble Lie, Ngaire Naffine

Cleveland State Law Review

In criminal law theory and doctrine there appear to be several competing assumptions about the sort of people that we are. My task in this paper is, first, to expound and compare what I see as the three prevailing theories of our rational natures to be found in criminal law theory, doctrine and procedure. Second, I will consider the relation between these theories of our rational natures and the actual practices of the criminal courts. And third, in the course of so doing, I will consider the beneficiaries and casualties of this criminal law theory and practical justice.