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20Schauer on precedent in the U.s. Supreme courtGeorgia State University Law Review 24 (2): 403-13. 2007.Recent critics of the Roberts Court chide it for its lack of regard for precedent. Fred Schauer faults these critics for erroneously assuming that a rule of stare decisis formerly played a significant role in the Supreme Court's decision-making. In fact, it has long played only a rare and weak role in the Court's work. Nonetheless, according to Schauer, the critics are to be thanked for invigorating a needed debate about the importance of "stability, consistency, settlement, reliance, notice, an…Read more
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5Death Penalties: a Review of Raoul Berger, Death Penalties (review)Duke Law Journal 1984 624-29. 1984.This is a critical review of Death Penalties by constitutional scholar Raoul Berger. It rebuts Berger's argument that the Eighth Amendment "no cruel and unusual punishments" clause validates capital punishment.
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193Political Authority, Moral Powers and the Intrinsic Value of ObedienceOxford Journal of Legal Studies 30 (1): 179-191. 2010.Three concepts—authority, obedience and obligation—are central to understanding law and political institutions. The three are also involved in the legitimation of the state: an apology for the state has to make a normative case for the state’s authority, for its right to command obedience, and for the citizen’s obligation to obey the state’s commands. Recent discussions manifest a cumulative scepticism about the apologist’s task. Getting clear about the three concepts is, of..
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201Is Law Coercive?Legal Theory 1 (1): 81-111. 1995.That law is coercive is something we all more or less take for granted. It is an assumption so rooted in our ways of thinking that it is taken as a given of social reality, an uncontroversial datum. Because it is so regarded, it is infrequently stated, and when it is, it is stated without any hint of possible complications or qualifications. I will call this the “prereflective view,” and I want to examine it with the care it deserves
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28The Duty to Obey the Law: Selected Philosophical Readings (edited book)Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 1998.The question 'Why should I obey the law?' introduces a contemporary puzzle that is as old as philosophy itself. The puzzle is especially troublesome if we think of cases in which breaking the law is not otherwise wrongful, and in which the chances of getting caught are negligible. Philosophers from Socrates to H.L.A. Hart have struggled to give reasoned support to the idea that we do have a general moral duty to obey the law but, more recently, the greater number of learned voices has expressed …Read more
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201Because I Said SoProblema. Anuario de Filosofía y Teoria Del Derecho 7 (7): 41-61. 2013.Political authority is the moral power to impose moral duties upon a perhaps unwilling citizenry. David Enoch has proposed that authority be understood as a matter of "robust" duty-giving. This paper argues that Enoch's conditions for attempted robust duty- or reason-giving are, along with his non-normative success condition, implausibly strong. Moreover, Enoch's attempt and normative- success conditions ignore two facts. The first is that success requires that citizens be tolerant of modest err…Read more
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72Charlie Hebdo Meets Utility MonsterThe Critique. forthcoming.The Charlie Hebdo massacre in January 2015 and the subsequent attacks of November 13 cast a garish light onto a conundrum at the center of how liberal democracies understand themselves. The Syrian emigrant crisis has added further color. How can a tolerant, liberal political culture tolerate the presence of intolerant, illiberal, sub-cultures while remaining true to its principles of tolerance? The problem falls within the intersection of two developments in the thinking of John Rawls, the great…Read more
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7He has two antagonists: the first pushes him from behind, from his origin. The second blocks his road ahead. He struggles with both. Actually the first supports him in his struggle with the second, for the first wants to push him forward; and in the same way the second supports him in his struggle with the first, for the second of course forces him back. But it is only theoretically so. For it is not only the two protagonists who are there, but he himself as well, and who really knows his intent…Read more
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57Comments on Richard Arneson's “Joel Feinberg and the justification of hard paternalism”Legal Theory 11 (3): 285-291. 2005.
APA Eastern Division
Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Social and Political Philosophy |
Philosophy of Law |
Areas of Interest
Social and Political Philosophy |