Law Commons^™

Of Persons And Property: The Politics Of Legal Taxonomy, David S. Cohen

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The essay falls into three major parts. In the first part, we explain and describe what we believe to be the core idea of law - that it represents a discursive and taxonomic economy which is used to give meaning to the world by creating a particular and partial reality. The concepts and language lawyers use, the way those media are deployed, the argumentative devices relied upon, and the values inculcated combine in conscious and unconscious ways to constitute law and a legal style of life. In part two, we tell two stories. One involves the Supreme Court's treatment of …