Law and Philosophy Commons^™

Foreword, The Honorable L. A. Harris Jr.

University of Richmond Law Review

“Your writing is so bad you will not be considered for Law Review and there is some question about your admittance to Law School.”

Life is strange and ironic. In 1974 as a second year law student at the T. C. Williams School of Law at the University of Richmond, I was invited to submit an article to determine if I would be permitted to serve on the Law Review. A member of the Law Review evaluated my article and met with me. In summation he said my writing was so bad that I would not be considered for Law …

Is There Really Anything Wrong With That? An Aristotelian Analysis Of Duty, Luke J. Mcgrath

Honors College Theses

In the iconic Seinfeld series finale, Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer find themselves in a peculiar legal predicament when they mock a crime rather than intervene to help the victim. The show’s commitment to portraying reality, even in its finale, vividly demonstrates the potential consequences of a society lacking the legal obligation to aid others. This comical incident raises a thought-provoking question about the legitimacy of duty-to-act laws in the United States. This thesis examines the application of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics to the concept of duty-to-act laws and argues for the necessity and benefits of such laws in promoting a …

Sovereignty Before Law, Salmoli Choudhuri, Moiz Tundawala

Articles

Book review: Violent Fraternity: Indian Political Thought in the Global Age, by Shruti Kapila, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2021, 328 pp., $37.00/£30.00, ISBN 9780691195223

Additional Materials For Judicial Uses Of Images: Vision In Decision, Peter Goodrich

Online Publications

These images are taken from published judicial decisions that are publicly available. The instances used are to analyze the manner in which judges see the subject matter of disputes and to elaborate a theory of the vision underlying decisions.

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Right To Hope: A New Perspective Of The Right To Have Expectations, Opportunities And Plans, Juan Carlos Riofrio

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

Hope has been considered to be an important and constitutive aspect of the human person, not only by philosophers of all backgrounds, but also by international and national courts of several countries especially in the last decade. As an existential aspect of each person, hope has multiple manifestations in private and public life. Up until now, authors and some cases have been discussing particular manifestations of the right to hope. While in the past these courts were more aware of the hopes raised in judicial litigation and ordinary life, now the inmates’ hope of being released is the major point …

What Do Law Professors Believe About Law And The Legal Academy?, Eric H. Martinez, Kevin Tobia

Faculty Scholarship

Legal scholarship is replete with debates about competing legal theories: textualism or purposivism; formalism or realism; natural law or positivism; prison reform or abolition; universal or culturally specific human rights? Despite voluminous literature about these debates, great uncertainty remains about which views experts endorse. This Article presents the first dataset of American law professors’ views about legal theory. A study of over six hundred law professors reveals expert consensus and dissensus about dozens of longstanding debates.

Law professors also debate questions about the legal academy. These include descriptive questions: Which subjects (for example, constitutional law) and methods (for example, law …

Defining And Balancing Equity, Erica Goldberg

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Collect Cosmic Dust, Make It Into Bright Stars: The Use Of Temporal Data In Regeneration Of Life Space And Time Via A Construction Of The Political-Sociological Theory Of Justice, Yi Wang

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis argues for an argument-counterargument approach to the atypical classics of Franz Kafka and Emily Dickinson. This approach to the literature is useful for a construction of the political-sociological theory of justice, which claims that the state of a just world is each individual’s lifetime moving in a dialectic-of-anti-violence-and-non-violence manner.

Are Handguns A Matter Of Privacy?, Bret N. Bogenschneider

St. Mary's Law Journal

The thesis developed in this Article is that the Heller and Bruen cases involved primarily right-to-privacy concerns. By its terms, the Second Amendment involves the collective right to bear Arms in connection to regulated militia service and does not mention handguns. Handguns were not “ordinary military weapons” employed by a militia at the time of the American revolution under the originalist view. The Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments are more appropriate sources for an individual privacy right related to the possession of handguns for private purposes, such as for self-defense or suicide. However, a prohibition of handguns under this approach would …

Ethics At The Speed Of Business, James A. Doppke Jr.

DePaul Business & Commercial Law Journal

This paper discusses several ways in which the Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct, and the Illinois Supreme Court Rules, construct barriers that prevent lawyers and businesses from accomplishing reasonable commercial goals. Often, those barriers arise from outdated concepts, or terminology that does not reflect current business realities. The paper argues for the amendment of specific Rules to enhance lawyers’ and businesses’ respective abilities to conduct their affairs more efficiently, without sacrificing public protection in the process.

Commentary: Further Prosecutions Over The 2020 Election Are Not Justified, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Did The Biden Administration Violate The First Amendment?, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Today’S Supreme Court: ‘Not A Normal Court,’ But Not Unprecedented Either, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Tinjauan Asas Demokrasi Ekonomi Atas Penyalahgunaan Posisi Dominan Dalam Membatasi Pengembang Teknologi Di Era Industri Kreatif : Studi Atas Tarif Layanan Google Play Store, Meriyanti Djaka

Jurnal Hukum & Pembangunan

National economic development in the creative industry era really requires community participation in utilizing technology, one of which is by developing digital application technology. Distribution of digital applications is generally marketed through the Google Play Store because of its very high market share in Indonesia. In marketing their products, technology developers charge a service fee of around 15-30% of in-app purchase sales for the applications they develop. This research aims to prove the abuse of a dominant position by companies distributing digital applications through the Google Play Store which limits technology developers, as well as reviewing this with the principles …

Pardon Me? Why Biden Should Pull A Gerald Ford When It Comes To Trump, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Six Lessons From The Debt Deal. What Did We Learn?, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Change We Can Believe In: The Seventh Circuit's Exposure Of Inadequate Environmental Review In Protect Our Parks V. Buttigieg, P. Nicholas Greco

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

On The Fence About Immigration And Overpopulation: "Environmentalists" Challenge Dhs Policies On Nepa Basis In Whitewater Draw Natural Resource Conservation District V. Mayorkas, Maya J. Williams

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

The Durham Report Shows Why We Don’T Want The Fbi Involved In Politics, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Proportionality V. Categorization: The Issue Of Judicial Balancing Of Rights, Akram Mohamed

Theses and Dissertations

The fact that there is a constant conflict between individual rights and state or social interests has historically provoked the question of how to balance or harmonize such conflicting interests? On what basis shall the legislator or the judge decide in favor of this or that right in his legislation or judgement? Where shall we, for example, draw the line between the right to freedom of expression and the right to protect one’s honor and reputation? How could the legislator find the compromise between the state duty to protect fetus life and its obligation not to interfere with woman’s right …

If The Gop Won’T Do It, Democrats Will Have To Block Trump’S Nomination For Them, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

The Juris Master: A Proposal For Reducing Excessive Public Defender Caseloads, Blake Comeaux

Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses

The US public defense system is underfunded, understaffed, and underdelivering on the Constitutional promises of the 6^th Amendment, the right to a fair and speedy trial. This state of our public defense system results in monstrous impacts for indigent defendants nationwide. Through indefinite delays in litigation, being abandoned in jail while sitting on waiting lists for public defenders, and being outright denied representation, indigent defendants are deprived of their rights. Beyond just defendant neglect, our current system puts immense strain on public defenders, prosecutors, and state budgets. In an attempt to combat this current state of affairs, this paper …

Political Theory And The Volunteer: Lessons From Kahn’S Ethnography Of ‘Our Unhappy Politics’, Benjamin Berger

All Papers

This article offers a reading of Paul Kahn’s Democracy in Our America that places this intimate “work of local political theory” in a central position in the landscape of his political thought. The article argues that the figure of the volunteer, as it appears in the volume, holds a space for love and meaning—and for political happiness—that secures for it a critical role in the system of beliefs and practices that sustain self-government in the United States. That framing draws the volunteer into relationship with Kahn’s thinking about the family, the veteran, and law. But it also means that the …

The American Debate Between Toleration And Liberty Of Conscience, Zachary Federico

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

No abstract provided.

The Unethical Use Of Children In War, Mariana Davis

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

This paper examines the role the nature of children has in the immorality of their use in warfare. The exploitation of children in war is a long, pervasive issue that is primarily documented in third-world countries with ongoing conflicts. This paper details the developments in the legality of the use of children in war. It expounds upon the current and historical use of child soldiers and the horrors that come with it. Evidence was taken from the consequences to the children and the nations that use them to demonstrate why this practice is unethical and immoral. This paper studies why …

Mentoring Programs: An Answer To The Cultural & Social Challenge Of Juvenile Rehabilitation, Isaiah Franqui

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

The juvenile delinquency epidemic in the United States has been approached using many methods. This paper is an attempt to showcase one method that is often glanced over, but may provide the best solution yet. A new promising outlook for the overall well-being of juveniles within the criminal justice system is the formation of mentoring programs. These programs connect at-risk youth and/or current juvenile delinquents to a mentor who, in turn, can help shift the direction of their lives. They often take place within community centers throughout the day and can present themselves in a number of different methods. Through …

The Pgh Synagogue Shooting Case Should’Ve Been Heard In Pa. Court, Bruce Ledewitz

Newspaper Columns

Collected biweekly contributions to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site.

Tender And Taint: Money And Complicity In Entanglement Jurisprudence, Amy J. Sepinwall

Notre Dame Law Review

Because liberalism is concerned with individual freedom, it finds that one person is responsible for the conduct of another only under very narrow circumstances. To a large extent, the law reflects this narrow conception of complicity. There is however one glaring exception to the law’s general resistance to complicity claims: where one actor becomes connected to another’s act through a pecuniary contribution, the law’s liberalism falls away. Money forges a cognizable association no matter how tenuous the causal connection and no matter the subsidizer’s attitudes toward the subsidized act. For example, in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, the Supreme Court recognized …

Religious Political Arguments, Accessibility, And Democratic Deliberation, Paul Billingham

Notre Dame Law Review

Christian critics of liberalism, and especially of contemporary public-reason liberalism, often argue that it objectionably excludes religious voices form the public square, by requiring citizens to bracket their religious convictions when they engage in democratic deliberation. In response, liberals often deny that their views have this implication. Many public-reason liberal theorists are “inclusivists,” who permit religious contributions to deliberation.

Yet even inclusivists provide little reason to think that religious political arguments can be persuasive or fruitful. After all, they tend to see religious reasons as inaccessible to others, due to relying on beliefs, values, and methods of reasoning that others …