Self-study
P1
Ronald Dworkin argues that judges are in danger of uncritically embracing an erroneous theory known as legal positivism because they think the only alternative is a theory that they (and Dworkin) see as clearly unacceptable—natural law. ███
Dworkin's perspective ·
Judges shouldn't embrace legal positivism
Dworkin thinks they might embrace legal positivism because they think it's the only alternative to natural law.
Natural law ·
Says judges should interpret law by consulting own morals
Dworkin rejects this.
P2
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Legal positivism ·
Meaning of law is based on social conventions
Just like how meanings of words are based on social conventions. According to legal positivism, disputes about meaning of law should be resolved by figuring out what's actually the consensus about the meaning.
P3
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Dworkin's perspective ·
Actual behavior by judges and lawyers isn't consistent with positivism
We need a theory that is based on what judges and lawyers actually do.
Dworkin's theory ·
Internal logic of law
Meaning of law should conform to the internal logic of law and the principles that law is based on, regardless of conventions. Principles might involve appeal to morals, but this isn't like natural law, because internal logic still matters.
P4
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Elaborate on Dworkin's theory ·
Positivist are wrong in focusing only on what people think law means
The internal logic of law constrains how we might interpret law.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
21.
Which one of the following ████ ██████████ █████████ ███ ████ █████ ██ ███ ████████
a
Dworkin regards natural ███ ██████ ██ █ ██████ ██████ ███████ █████ ██████████ ███ ████████ █████████
Dworkin says that natural law theory is an unacceptable form of judicial activism; it’s not a middle ground. Instead, Dworkin’s theory is
b
Dworkin holds that ████████ ███████████████ ██████ ███ ██ █████ ██████ ██ ███████████ █ █████████ ██ ██████ ██ █████ ██████████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████ ████ ███ █████████ ████ █████████ ███ ████
Dworkin criticizes interpretations based solely on identifying a consensus (legal positivism) and interpretations based solely on moral intuition (natural law theory). His theory, described in P3 and P4, is that interpretations should instead conform to the internal logic of the law.
c
Dworkin argues that ███ ████████ █████ ██ ███ ███ ██████ █████████ █████ ██████ ██████ ██ █████████ █████ █████████ ██ ██████████ ██ ██████ ████ ██████ █████ ███████████
Dworkin does say that the internal logic of the law should guide judges. But he says that this internal logic can
d
Dworkin's theory of █████ ██████████████ ██ █████ ██ █████████ ███████ ████ ███████ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ███████████
Dworkin’s theory attempts to find a middle ground between natural law theory and legal positivism, but that doesn’t mean it’s based equally on both theories. The central idea of Dworkin’s theory— that judicial decisions should be based on the logic of the law— isn’t mentioned in either of the other theories.
e
Dworkin validates judges' ██████████ ██ █████ ██████████ ███████ ███ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ █ ████ ███ ████ ██ █████ █████ █ ██████ █████████ ██ ███ ████████
Dworkin thinks that judges can sometimes “consult”—not depend on— their moral intuition when arriving at an interpretation, but only within the context of the internal logic of the law. He thinks that the internal logic of the law is more important than a consensus and than judges’ moral intuitions.