Syllabus
Philosophy of Law
Spring 2012
Two books should
be purchased for the course:
1) H.L.A.
Hart, The Concept of Law
(Oxford: Clarendon, 2d ed. 1994)
2) Scott Shapiro, Legality (Harvard,
2011)
The following is partial and provisional only:
I. Is there a moral
duty to obey the law?
Reading: Joseph
Raz, The Obligation to Obey:
Revision and Tradition, 1 Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics,
and Public Policy 139-55 (1984) [available
at Hein-Online]
M.B.E. Smith, Is There a Prima Facie Obligation to
Obey the Law?, 82 Yale L, J. 950-76 (1973) [available on JSTOR]
II. Theories of Law: An Introduction
Reading:
Hart Ch. 1; Shapiro Chs. 1-2
III. Austin's legal positivism
Reading:
Shapiro Ch. 3
Hart, The Concept
of Law ch. IV
V. Hart's legal positivism
Reading:
Hart, The Concept of Law chs.
V-VI; Shapiro Ch. 4
VI. What is the rule of recognition
for the American legal system?
Reading:
Kent Greenawalt, The Rule of
Recognition and the Constitution, 85 Mich. L. Rev. 621 (1987)
[available on WESTLAW]
- do not read Part II, pp. 624-30, or
Part VIII.C, pp. 662-70
VII. The paradox of
self-amendment
Reading:
Alf Ross, On Self-Reference and a
Puzzle in Constitutional Law, 78 Mind 1-24 (1969) [available on JSTOR]
- read ONLY
pp. 1-7 and pp. 20-24.
VIII. The planning theory
Reading: Shapiro Chs. 5-7
IX. Legal Realism and Rule-Skepticism
Reading: Hart Ch. 7
Felix Cohen, Transcendental Nonsense and the Functional Approach, 35 Colum. L. Rev. 809 (1935) - pp. 809-12, 820-21, 834-49 only
X. The planning theory continued
Reading: Shapiro Ch. 8 (pp. 240-43 only), Chs. 9-14
XI. The Relevance of Semantics to Legal Interpretation
Reading: David Brink, Legal Theory, Legal Interpretation, and Judicial Review, 17 Phil. & Public Affairs 105-07, 111-24 (1988) [I will email you the article.]
XII. International Law
Reading: Hart Ch. X
XIII. Is the Objectivity of Morality Relevant to Whether the Law Should Refer to Moral Considerations?
Reading: Jeremy Waldron, The Irrelevance of Moral Objectivity, in Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays 158 (Robert P. George ed., 1992) [I will email this to you]