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The Five Days In June When Values Died In American Law, Bruce Ledewitz
The Five Days In June When Values Died In American Law, Bruce Ledewitz
Akron Law Review
During a five day period in June, 1992, every Justice on the United States Supreme Court joined one or the other of two opinions that denied the objectivity of values—either Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion in Lee v. Weisman or Justice Scalia’s dissent in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Both of these opinions expressed the view that normative judgments are merely human constructions. This moment represents symbolically the death of values in American law. The arrival of nihilism at the heart of American law is a world-changing event for law that must be acknowledged.
The death of values was announced by …