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Facts

This case consolidates several different cases from Delaware, Kansas, South Carolina, and Virginia. Several black children sought, through legal representation, admission to public schools that allowed or required racial segregation. The plaintiffs alleged that racial segregation was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

A three-judge federal district court denied the plaintiffs relief under the “separate but equal” doctrine in all but one case, citing Plessy v. Ferguson. The plaintiffs appealed to the Supreme Court, contending that segregated schools were not equal and could not be made equal and that the plaintiffs were therefore deprived of equal protection of the laws.

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Is there a moral obligation to obey the law?

Is it immoral to ever disobey any particular law no matter what the law or reasons? It seems it depends on the law, the situation and one’s reasons. When considering whether we have an obligation to obey the law, some would answer that it depends on what is meant by “law.” By law do we mean moral law or man-made law? Martin Luther King, Jr., a premier example of civil disobedience in our day, wrote in a letter to his fellow clergyman from jail in Birmingham regarding unjust man-made law that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” According to Augustine, an unjust man- made law is really no law at all. While there seems to be a legal and moral responsibility to obey just laws in this view, there also seems to be a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. Just law can be understood as man-made code that is consistent with moral law, whereas unjust law can be understood as human law not rooted in eternal and natural law.

Others, like Mill would answer by appealing to the principle of utility. In his view, the law does not add anything to the morality of the situation. There is no moral obligation to obey the law. It is the consequences that matter. The question then becomes, are the consequences of my disobedience good overall, or are they harmful? Kant would ask, what if everyone did it? His categorical imperative claims that if one can will one’s maxim to be universal law without contradiction, then one’s maxim is moral and one must act on it. Otherwise, it is not moral and one must refrain from acting on it.

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Dworkin

Christopher Hurtado —  January 19, 2010

Dworkin’s main objection to Hart’s positivism is that the law ought to “take rights seriously.” If Hart’s claim that the adjudication of a hard case rests upon a judge’s personal opinion, intuition or his exercise of strong discretion, then rights are seriously compromised. In Dworkin’s view, rights are more important than other considerations such community welfare. Rights must not be subordinated to the interest of the community. They must be recognized as a part of the law. Dworkin argues that history provides more support for individual rights and liberty than legal positivism does.

 

In Lost Empire, Dworkin attacks conventionalism and pragmatism. According to conventionalism, law is a function of social convention-cum-legal convention. In other words, law simply consists in following convention. In this view, judges may exercise strong discretion in adjudicating. Continue Reading…

Rules? What Rules?

Christopher Hurtado —  January 15, 2010

Introduction

Strawson argued that Russell conflated meaning and reference because Russell held that to be meaningful, expressions and sentences had to have a reference. Russell argued that for every meaningful piece of language there has to be a chunk of reality to which it refers, even if it is just a propositional function. Strawson asserted that the meaning of a word is not its reference, but the rules for the use of that word. Prima facie, this seems like it might work with indexicals, if not with with non-indexicals. However, I will argue that, despite the intuitive appeal of  Strawson’s theory, he is ultimately begging the question in arguing against Russell. Rules for the use of words, whether indexical or non-indexical, cannot be significantly specified without relying on Russellian reference.

Background

A perennial problem in the philosophy of language is how expressions and sentences with no reference have meaning. For example, the sentence “The king of France is wise” is meaningful even though France is no longer a monarchy. “The king of France” is the subject of the sentence. So, if the sentence is meaningful, it is about the king of France. But if France is no longer a monarchy, then what is the sentence about? Furthermore, according to Russell, if the sentence is meaningful, it must be either true or false. If the king of France is wise, then the sentence is true. If the king of France is not wise, it is false. But for the sentence to be true or false, France would have to be a monarchy. In 1905, Russell gave a theory to explain the meaning of sentences with no reference in On Denoting. In it, he proposed an answer to both of the above paradoxes.

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Hart

Christopher Hurtado —  January 12, 2010

Hart distinguishes between social habits and social rules. While following social habits is habitual, breaking them does not bring about harsh criticism or censure. Breaking social rules on the other hand does. Social rules seem to bind us and laws seem to be social rules. There are two perspectives to this: the external aspect and the internal aspect. The external aspect is the independently observable fact that people do tend to regularly follow the rules. The internal aspect is one’s sense of obligation to follow the rule. It is from this aspect which the law acquires its normative quality. This aspect is also know as the “critical reflective attitude.” Hart calls the populace’s obedience of a rule “efficacy.” For a law to be efficacious, the majority of the populace must follow it. While the average citizen of a modern state with a developed legal system may feel compelled by the internal aspect, it is more important for the officials of the society to feel compelled by it since they must follow constitutional provisions they could ignore with impunity.

 

Laws are more than just rules of conduct. There are two types of laws: primary rules and secondary rules. Primary rules are rules of conduct. Secondary rules are rules that apply to officials and govern the execution of primary rules. Secondary rules address three problems: The first is the problem of the uncertainty regarding what the law is. A secondary rule Hart calls “the rule of recognition” states the criteria for the validity of laws. The second is the problem of the rigidity of rules. This problem necessitates “rules of change” which govern changes in the law. The third is the problem of how to resolve legal disputes. This problem gives rise to “rules of adjudication.”

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Natural Law

Christopher Hurtado —  January 7, 2010

Natural law refers to an objective set of principles independent of and higher than human law, knowable by human reason and upon which human law is based. In religious terms, natural law refers to the human understanding of divine law or the laws of nature. In non-religious terms, it refers to an objective set of principles necessary for human prosperity which constrain human actions and social arrangements. In either case, natural law is universal and unchanging. Its principles are in accordance with human nature and conducive to human flourishing and are thus binding on human conscience. Some natural law theories argue that human laws that do not to conform to natural law are not rightly called laws; others note that these laws fall short, but allow that they can be called laws nevertheless.

Who were the poets in Plato’s time? What did Plato have against them? Why does Plato banish them? How does he justify it? How then does he justify his own use of literary and rhetorical devices in his philosophical writings? What then is to distinguish his writings from those of the poets? The first question will be answered below. Plato answers the next three questions himself in Book X of the Republic. It is the last two questions that remain unanswered. Unless Plato’s writings can be distinguished from those of the poets he banishes, Plato fails to distinguish between philosophy and poetry, between reason and rhetoric.

In Plato’s time, the poets were considered moral authorities. Poetry was recited in song and education consisted in memorizing and reciting poetry. All knowledge was transmitted orally by this means. It is not surprising then, that Socrates’ interlocutors were given to citing the poets in the same way Christians cite the Bible to defend their arguments when he pressed them. Thus, philosophy sought to develop reason in opposition to oral tradition based on poetry. In order to establish philosophy and reason as a path to knowledge superior to poetry, Plato had to take on the conventional wisdom of his time, which was embodied by poetry.

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Je me suis marié tôt le matin parce que j’avais l’intention de partir en croisière avec ma femme après la réception de mariage pour notre lune de miel. Je me suis réveillé bien tôt ce matin là pour me préparer pour mon mariage avec l’aide de mes beaux-frères. Toute ma famille était présente au mariage, sauf mon père. C’était un jour de joie pour nous tous. Tout le monde était souriant. Mon épouse était ravissante! Je me sentais si heureux de l’épouser! Après le mariage, mon épouse et moi nous avons pris des photos avec nos familles en dehors du temple. Il faisait beau pendant que nous prenaient des photos, mais après cela, il a commencé à pleuvoir. Nous sommes partis pour l’église tout de suite.

Nous avons mangé notre gâteau de mariage là-bas et nous avons reçu nos amis et leurs dons avant de partir pressés pour aller à Galveston pour la croisière.  Le gâteau était délicieux! Avant de partir, nous avons beaucoup parlé avec nos amis. Au moment de notre départ, il pleuvait encore plus. Ma belle-mère à conduit la voiture au port de Galveston. Ma femme et moi nous étions assis sur le siège arrière. Nous nous sommes embrassés souvent dans la voiture en route pour le port. On souriait beaucoup.

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Before September 11, 2001, very few Americans were aware of the book Milestones or its author, Sayyid Qutb. Islamists, on the other hand, consider this work a manifesto for the fundamentalist movement, and its author, Sayyid Qutb, the most influential Muslim ideologue of the last half of the 20th century. This paper will look at the background of Qutb and present a critical analysis of his work, Milestones. It will argue that Qutb’s ideology is internally inconsistent. It will identify numerous major inconsistencies found in Milestones. For example, while Qutb calls for Islamic leadership, he insists that anyone who exercises authority over men is usurping God’s role. He also insists that men have complete religious freedom while advocating the destruction of all jahili groups. This paper will begin with a chronological background, while the critical analysis of the work will proceed in the order in which the work was written.

The author of Milestones, Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian novelist and literature teacher, was born in 1906 in the village of Musha, township of Qaha, in the province of Assyout in Southern Egypt (El-Kadi 1). His parents were highly religious and sent him to a religious school in his village. He was a good student, industrious, and eager to acquire knowledge, a trait that persisted throughout his life. By the time he was ten years old he had already memorized the entire text of the Qur’an. Qutb transferred to a government school and graduated in 1918. In 1920 he moved to Cairo to continue his schooling, where he received a Western-style education attending college at Dar al-Ulum University. It was there that he met Hasan al-Banna, who founded the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928, an organization that would become an important influence later in his life (Amis 3, Berman 2, Loboda 1, Irwin 1).

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Il ya quelques années, j’ai pris des vacances de six semaines avec ma femme et mes enfants. Nous avons voyagé en avion et en voiture. Premièrement, nous avons emmenés les enfants de mon épouse à l’aéroport pour aller à la maison de leur père en Utah. Puis ma femme et moi, nous avons quitté Houston pour aller en Utah également avec les parents de ma femme. Nous sommes allés vers Utah pour une réunion familiale de la famille de mon beau-père. Nous sommes restées en Utah que quelques jours, mais avons passé un bon moment en famille. À notre retour à Houston, nous avons prévu d’aller à Baltimore pour assister à une autre réunion de famille le lendemain, mais nous étions très fatigués. Par conséquent, nous avons décidé de passer un jour de repos à Houston avant le départ.

Le lendemain nous sommes partis pour Atlanta en voiture. À Atlanta, nous avons passé la nuit dans la maison de ma cousine. Le lendemain nous sommes partis pour Bethléem, en Pennsylvanie. Nous avons passé la nuit avec le frère de ma femme et avons visité New York. Ce fut la première fois que ma femme est allée à New York. Nous avons vu Battery Park, Wall Street, Times Square, Broadway, Central Park et la Cinquième Avenue. C’était amusant de partager cette expérience avec ma femme. Le lendemain nous sommes partis pour Philadelphie pour déjeuner avec un de mes clients, en route vers Baltimore. À Philadelphie, nous avons visité les bureaux de mon client et avons déjeuné à l’hôtel Hilton. Après le déjeuner, nous avons continué sur le chemin de Baltimore. À Baltimore, nous sommes restés à la maison de mes grands-parents.

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