Law and Philosophy Commons^™

Legality, Morality, Duality, Joshua P. Davis

Utah Law Review

This Article proposes legal dualism as a novel resolution to one of the central debates in jurisprudence—that between natural law and legal positivism. It holds that the nature of law varies with the purpose for which it is being interpreted. Natural law provides the best account of the law when it serves as a source of moral guidance and legal positivism provides the best account of the law when it does not.

What Is The Philosophy Of Law?, John M. Finnis

Journal Articles

The philosophy of law is not separate from but dependent upon ethics and political philosophy, which it extends by that attention to the past (of sources, constitutions, contracts, acquired rights, etc.) which is characteristic of juridical thought for reasons articulated by the philosophy of law. Positivism is legitimate only as a thesis of, or topic within, natural law theory, which adequately incorporates it but remains transparently engaged with the ethical and political issues and challenges both perennial and peculiar to this age. The paper concludes by proposing a task for legal philosophy, in light of the fact that legal systems …

How Trade Law Changed: Why It Should Change Again, John Linarelli

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

December 30, 2013: The Moral Universe, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Moral Universe“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

An Opinion For The Ages, Bruce Ledewitz

Ledewitz Papers

Published scholarship collected from academic journals, law reviews, newspaper publications & online periodicals

December 25, 2013: The Future Of The Secular Outlook, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Future of the Secular Outlook“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

December 21, 2013: Donald Rumsfeld And The Banality Of Evil, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Donald Rumsfeld and the Banality of Evil“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

December 15, 2013: Self Actualization Is Sin, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Self Actualization Is Sin“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

December 8, 2013: President Obama In The Sweet Spo, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “President Obama in the Sweet Spo“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

December 4, 2013: God Again, Or, Am I An Atheist?, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “God Again, Or, Am I an Atheist?“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Actmissions, Luis E. Chiesa

West Virginia Law Review

Most observers agree that it is morally worse to cause harm by engaging in an act than to contribute to producing the same harm by an omission. As a result, American criminal law punishes harmful omissions less than similarly harmful acts, unless there are exceptional circumstances that warrant punishing them equally. Yet there are many cases in which actors cause harm by engaging in conduct that can be reasonably described as either an act or an omission. Think of a doctor who flips a switch that discontinues life support to a patient. If the patient dies as a result, did …

The Paradoxes Of Restitution, Mark A. Edwards

West Virginia Law Review

Restitution following mass dispossession is often considered both ideal and impossible. Why? This Article identifies two previously unnamed paradoxes that undermine the possibility of restitution: the time-unworthiness paradox and the collective responsibility paradox. After developing these ideas, the Article examines them in the context of a particularly difficult and intractable case of dispossession and restitution. The Article draws upon interviews with restitution claimants whose stories reveal the paradoxes of restitution.

November 28, 2013: The Theology Of The Disappearance Of Thanksgiving, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Theology of the Disappearance of Thanksgiving“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Stretching Religious Liberty, Bruce Ledewitz

Ledewitz Papers

Published scholarship collected from academic journals, law reviews, newspaper publications & online periodicals

November 20, 2013: God Is Not A Supernatural Thing, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “God is not a Supernatural Thing“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

November 16, 2013: The Mythical Elements Of The Bible, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Mythical Elements of the Bible“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

November 13, 2013: Huffington Post Blog Entry On Legislative Prayer, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Huffington Post Blog Entry on Legislative Prayer“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

November 8, 2013: Legislative Prayer, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Legislative Prayer“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Fuller And Godel: Prophets Against The Evils Of Positivism: How The Natural Law Is Necessary To Provide Legal Meaning And Consistency, Henry James Garon

LLM Theses

Gödel showed that formal systems which discuss natural numbers cannot be complete or prove their own consistency. Incompleteness in this sense is limited to formal systems, and so is not applicable to law by it own terms.

Looking to the philosophy behind the Incompleteness Theorem, Gödel intended to show that positivism was a bankrupt world-view, and this resonates strongly with Lon Fuller. Fuller is analogous to Gödel in his condemnation of the positivist philosophy because he showed that a system of rules, by itself, was not capable of rendering judgments. A legal system is dependent upon an external morality, but …

November 3, 2013: Ronald Dworkin's Confusion, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Ronald Dworkin's Confusion“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.