Download or read book Judges and Unjust Laws written by Douglas E. Edlin and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2010-07-22 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "With keen insight into the common law mind, Edlin argues that there are rich resources within the law for judges to ground their opposition to morally outrageous laws, and a legal obligation on them to overturn it, consequent on the general common law obligation to develop the law. Thus, seriously unjust laws pose for common law judges a dilemma within the law, not just a moral challenge to the law, a conflict of obligations, not just a crisis of conscience. While rooted firmly in the history of common law jurisprudence, Edlin offers an entirely fresh perspective on an age-old jurisprudential conundrum. Edlin's case for his thesis is compelling." ---Gerald J. Postema, Cary C. Boshamer Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Law, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and author of Bentham and the Common Law Tradition "Douglas Edlin builds a powerful historical, conceptual, and moral case for the proposition that judges on common law grounds should refuse to enforce unjust legislation. This is sure to be controversial in an age in which critics already excoriate judges for excessive activism when conducting constitutional judicial review. Edlin's challenge to conventional views is bold and compelling." ---Brian Z. Tamanaha, Chief Judge Benjamin N. Cardozo Professor of Law, St. John's University, and author of Law as a Means to an End: Threat to the Rule of Law "Professor Edlin's fascinating and well-researched distinction between constitutional review and common law review should influence substantially both scholarship on the history of judicial power in the United States and contemporary jurisprudential debates on the appropriate use of that power." ---Mark Graber, Professor of Law and Government, University of Maryland, and author of Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil Is a judge legally obligated to enforce an unjust law? In Judges and Unjust Laws, Douglas E. Edlin uses case law analysis, legal theory, constitutional history, and political philosophy to examine the power of judicial review in the common law tradition. He finds that common law tradition gives judges a dual mandate: to apply the law and to develop it. There is no conflict between their official duty and their moral responsibility. Consequently, judges have the authority---perhaps even the obligation---to refuse to enforce laws that they determine unjust. As Edlin demonstrates, exploring the problems posed by unjust laws helps to illuminate the institutional role and responsibilities of common law judges. Douglas E. Edlin is Associate Professor of Political Science at Dickinson College.

Download or read book Limits of Legality written by Jeffrey Brand-Ballard and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Judges sometimes hear cases in which the law, as they honestly understand it, requires results that they consider morally objectionable. Most people assume that, nevertheless, judges have an ethical obligation to apply the law correctly, at least in reasonably just legal systems. This is the view of most lawyers, legal scholars, and private citizens, but the arguments for it have received surprisingly little attention from philosophers. Combiming ethical theory with discussions of caselaw, Jeffrey Brand-Ballard challenges arguments for the traditional view, including arguments from the fact that judges swear oaths to uphold the law, and arguments from our duty to obey the law, among others. He then develops an alternative argument based on ways in which the rule of law promotes the good. Patterns of excessive judicial lawlessness, even when morally motivated, can damage the rule of law. Brand-Ballard explores the conditions under which individual judges are morally responsible for participating in destructive patterns of lawless judging. These arguments build upon recent theories of collective intentionality and presuppose an agent-neutral framework, rather than the agent-relative framework favored by many moral philosophers. Defying the conventional wisdom, Brand-Ballard argues that judges are not always morally obligated to apply the law correctly. Although they have an obligation not to participate in patterns of excessive judicial lawlessness, an individual departure from the law so as to avoid an unjust result is rarely a moral mistake if the rule of law is otherwise healthy. Limits of Legality will interest philosophers, legal scholars, lawyers, and anyone concerned with the ethics of judging.

Download or read book Justice Accused written by Robert M. Cover and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 1975-01-01 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What should a judge do when he must hand down a ruling based on a law that he considers unjust or oppressive? This question is examined through a series of problems concerning unjust law that arose with respect to slavery in nineteenth-century America. "Cover's book is splendid in many ways. His legal history and legal philosophy are both first class. . . . This is, for a change, an interdisciplinary work that is a credit to both disciplines."--Ronald Dworkin, Times Literary Supplement "Scholars should be grateful to Cover for his often brilliant illumination of tensions created in judges by changing eighteenth- and nineteenth-century jurisprudential attitudes and legal standards. . . An exciting adventure in interdisciplinary history."--Harold M. Hyman, American Historical Review "A most articulate, sophisticated, and learned defense of legal formalism. . . Deserves and needs to be widely read."--Don Roper, Journal of American History "An excellent illustration of the way in which a burning moral issue relates to the American judicial process. The book thus has both historical value and a very immediate importance."--Edwards A. Stettner, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science "A really fine book, an important contribution to law and to history."--Louis H. Pollak

Download or read book The Federalist Papers written by Alexander Hamilton and published by Read Books Ltd. This book was released on 2018-08-20 with total page 420 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Classic Books Library presents this brand new edition of “The Federalist Papers”, a collection of separate essays and articles compiled in 1788 by Alexander Hamilton. Following the United States Declaration of Independence in 1776, the governing doctrines and policies of the States lacked cohesion. “The Federalist”, as it was previously known, was constructed by American statesman Alexander Hamilton, and was intended to catalyse the ratification of the United States Constitution. Hamilton recruited fellow statesmen James Madison Jr., and John Jay to write papers for the compendium, and the three are known as some of the Founding Fathers of the United States. Alexander Hamilton (c. 1755–1804) was an American lawyer, journalist and highly influential government official. He also served as a Senior Officer in the Army between 1799-1800 and founded the Federalist Party, the system that governed the nation’s finances. His contributions to the Constitution and leadership made a significant and lasting impact on the early development of the nation of the United States.

Download or read book Unfair written by Adam Benforado and published by Crown. This book was released on 2015 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A legal scholar exposes the psychological forces that undermine the American criminal justice system, arguing that unless hidden biases are addressed, social inequality will widen, and proposes reforms to prevent injustice and help achieve true equality before the law.

Download or read book The Unconstitutionality of Slavery written by Lysander Spooner and published by . This book was released on 1845 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Common Law Tradition written by Karl N. Llewellyn and published by Quid Pro Books. This book was released on 2016-05-21 with total page 554 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Unjust by Design written by S. Ronald Ellis and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unjust by Design describes a system in need of major restructuring. Written by a respected critic, it presents a modern theory of administrative justice fit for that purpose. It also provides detailed blueprints for the changes the author believes would be necessary if justice were to in fact assume its proper role in Canada’s administrative justice system.

Download or read book Model Rules of Professional Conduct written by American Bar Association. House of Delegates and published by American Bar Association. This book was released on 2007 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Model Rules of Professional Conduct provides an up-to-date resource for information on legal ethics. Federal, state and local courts in all jurisdictions look to the Rules for guidance in solving lawyer malpractice cases, disciplinary actions, disqualification issues, sanctions questions and much more. In this volume, black-letter Rules of Professional Conduct are followed by numbered Comments that explain each Rule's purpose and provide suggestions for its practical application. The Rules will help you identify proper conduct in a variety of given situations, review those instances where discretionary action is possible, and define the nature of the relationship between you and your clients, colleagues and the courts.

Download or read book Equal Justice written by Frederick Wilmot-Smith and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A philosophical and legal argument for equal access to good lawyers and other legal resources. Should your risk of wrongful conviction depend on your wealth? We wouldn’t dream of passing a law to that effect, but our legal system, which permits the rich to buy the best lawyers, enables wealth to affect legal outcomes. Clearly justice depends not only on the substance of laws but also on the system that administers them. In Equal Justice, Frederick Wilmot-Smith offers an account of a topic neglected in theory and undermined in practice: justice in legal institutions. He argues that the benefits and burdens of legal systems should be shared equally and that divergences from equality must issue from a fair procedure. He also considers how the ideal of equal justice might be made a reality. Least controversially, legal resources must sometimes be granted to those who cannot afford them. More radically, we may need to rethink the centrality of the market to legal systems. Markets in legal resources entrench pre-existing inequalities, allocate injustice to those without means, and enable the rich to escape the law’s demands. None of this can be justified. Many people think that markets in health care are unjust; it may be time to think of legal services in the same way.

Download or read book Review of Lysander Spooner s Essay on the Unconstitutionality of Slavery written by Wendell Phillips and published by . This book was released on 1847 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Can Abolitionists Vote Or Take Office Under the United States Constitution written by Wendell Phillips and published by . This book was released on 1845 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Broken Scales written by Joel Cohen and published by . This book was released on 2017 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: However rare, some injustices are "objectively" determined, often through DNA evidence, which allows us to squarely establish innocence despite a conviction. But the stories selected for this book represent a cross-section: some are such that (almost) every reader will see and acknowledge the wrong, and some interviews may leave the readers scratching his head, wondering "what was the author thinking?" By speaking with those impacted by injustices that occurred over the last 60 years--during the 1950s at the height of McCarthyism, the 1980s in Louisiana and New York when race played a large a role in how justice was dispensed and how the media portrayed the participants, the aftermath of 9/11 when many were prepared to believe the worst, and the time shortly before the Supreme Court decided that marriage could be granted to same-sex couples--this book requires readers to look at injustice in the context of our times. The stories told by the participants themselves give the reader insight into the challenges of dispensing, and even commenting on, justice. The author asks difficult questions: Is there an injustice when the game seems to have been played fairly, but the System still got it wrong? Is it an injustice when a jury, properly charged with the evidence fairly presented, convicts the wrong man? Or when people, so passionate in their own point of view, use over-the-top tactics to persuade others of their position? These interviews add to the important--and what must be ongoing--conversation about injustice in America

Download or read book How Judges Think written by Richard A. Posner and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2010-05-01 with total page 399 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A distinguished and experienced appellate court judge, Richard A. Posner offers in this new book a unique and, to orthodox legal thinkers, a startling perspective on how judges and justices decide cases. When conventional legal materials enable judges to ascertain the true facts of a case and apply clear pre-existing legal rules to them, Posner argues, they do so straightforwardly; that is the domain of legalist reasoning. However, in non-routine cases, the conventional materials run out and judges are on their own, navigating uncharted seas with equipment consisting of experience, emotions, and often unconscious beliefs. In doing so, they take on a legislative role, though one that is confined by internal and external constraints, such as professional ethics, opinions of respected colleagues, and limitations imposed by other branches of government on freewheeling judicial discretion. Occasional legislators, judges are motivated by political considerations in a broad and sometimes a narrow sense of that term. In that open area, most American judges are legal pragmatists. Legal pragmatism is forward-looking and policy-based. It focuses on the consequences of a decision in both the short and the long term, rather than on its antecedent logic. Legal pragmatism so understood is really just a form of ordinary practical reasoning, rather than some special kind of legal reasoning. Supreme Court justices are uniquely free from the constraints on ordinary judges and uniquely tempted to engage in legislative forms of adjudication. More than any other court, the Supreme Court is best understood as a political court.

Download or read book Judicial Methods of Interpretation of the Law written by Julio C. Cueto-Rua and published by Publications Institute Paul M. Hebert Law Center Louisiana S. This book was released on 1981 with total page 536 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Judges Against Justice written by Hans Petter Graver and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-09-11 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores concrete situations in which judges are faced with a legislature and an executive that consciously and systematically discard the ideals of the rule of law. It revolves around three basic questions: What happen when states become oppressive and the judiciary contributes to the oppression? How can we, from a legal point of view, evaluate the actions of judges who contribute to oppression? And, thirdly, how can we understand their participation from a moral point of view and support their inclination to resist?

Download or read book Inconsistency and Indecision in the United States Supreme Court written by Matthew P Hitt and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2019-05-20 with total page 235 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States Supreme Court exists to resolve constitutional disputes among lower courts and the other branches of government, allowing elected officials, citizens, and businesses to act without legal uncertainty. American law and society function more effectively when the Court resolves these ambiguous questions of Constitutional law. Since lower courts must defer to its reasoning, the Court should also promulgate clear and consistent legal doctrine, giving a reason for its judgment that a majority of justices support. Yet a Court that prioritizes resolving many disputes will at times produce contradictory sets of opinions or fail to provide a rationale and legal precedent for its decision at all. In either case, it produces an unreasoned judgment. Conversely, a Court that prioritizes logically consistent doctrine will fail to resolve many underlying disputes in law and society. Inconsistency and Indecision in the United States Supreme Court demonstrates that over time, institutional changes, lobbied for by the justices, substantially reduced unreasoned judgments in the Court’s output, coinciding with a reduction in the Court’s caseload. Hence, the Supreme Court historically emphasized the first goal of dispute resolution, but evolved into a Court that prioritizes the second goal of logically consistent doctrine. As a result, the Court today fails to resolve more underlying questions in law and society in order to minimize criticism of its output from other elites. In so doing, the modern Court often fails to live up to its Constitutional obligation.