New Essays on the Nature of Legal Reasoning

361 Pages·2022·4.918 MB·English

by  Mark McBride, James Penner, George Pavlakos

NEW ESSAYS ON THE NATURE OF LEGAL REASONING
This is the fi rst book to bring together distinguished jurisprudential theorists, as
well as up-and-coming scholars, to critically assess the nature of legal reasoning.
The volume is divided into three parts.
The fi rst part, ‘General Jurisprudence and Legal Reasoning’, addresses issues
at the intersection of general jurisprudence – those pertaining to the nature of
law itself – and legal reasoning.
The second part, ‘Rules and Reasons’, addresses two concepts central to
two prominent types of theory of legal reasoning.
The essays in the third and fi nal part, ‘Doctrine and Practice’, delve into the
mechanics of legal doctrine and practice, from a legal reasoning perspective.
Volume 14 in the series Law and Practical Reason
Law and Practical Reason
The intention of this series is that it should encompass monographs and collec-
tions of essays that address the fundamental issues in legal philosophy. The foci
are conceptual and normative in character, not empirical. Studies addressing the
idea of law as a species of practical reason are especially welcome. Recognising
that there is no occasion sharply to distinguish analytic and systematic work in
the fi eld from historico-critical research, the editors also welcome studies in the
history of legal philosophy. Contributions to the series, inevitably crossing disci-
plinary lines, will be of interest to students and professionals in moral, political,
and legal philosophy.
General Editor
Prof George Pavlakos (Glasgow)
Advisory Board
Prof Robert Alexy (Kiel)
Prof Samantha Besson (Coll é ge de France and Fribourg, CH)
Prof Emilios Christodoulidis (Glasgow)
Prof Sean Coyle (Birmingham)
Prof Mattias Kumm (New York and Berlin)
Prof Stanley Paulson (St Louis and Kiel)
Prof Joseph Raz (Columbia Law School and King ’ s College London)
Prof Arthur Ripstein (Toronto)
Prof Scott Shapiro (Yale Law School)
Prof Victor Tadros (Warwick)
Recent titles in the series
Volume 8: Private Law and the Value of Choice
Emmanuel Voyiakis
Volume 9 : Freedom and Force: Essays on Kant ’ s Legal Philosophy
Edited by S ari Kisilevsky and Martin J Stone
Volume 10: The Nature and Value of Vagueness in the Law
Hrafn Asgeirsson
Volume 11: Law ’ s Humility: Enlarging the Scope of Jurisprudential Disagreement
Triantafyllos Gkouvas
Volume 12: Rightful Relations with Distant Strangers: Kant, the EU, and the
Wider World
Aravind Ganesh
Volume 13 : The Making of Constitutional Democracy: From Creation to
Application of Law
Paolo Sandro
Volume 14 : New Essays on the Nature of Legal Reasoning
Edited by Mark McBride and James Penner
New Essays on the Nature
of Legal Reasoning
Edited by
Mark McBride
and
James Penner
HART PUBLISHING
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Kemp House , Chawley Park, Cumnor Hill, Oxford , OX2 9PH , UK
1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA
29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland
HART PUBLISHING, the Hart/Stag logo, BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are
trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
First published in Great Britain 2022
Copyright © The editors and contributors severally 2022
The editors and contributors have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988 to be identifi ed as Authors of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage
or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers.
While every care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of this work, no responsibility for
loss or damage occasioned to any person acting or refraining from action as a result of any
statement in it can be accepted by the authors, editors or publishers.
All UK Government legislation and other public sector information used in the work is Crown Copyright © .
All House of Lords and House of Commons information used in the work is Parliamentary Copyright © .
This information is reused under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 ( h ttp://www.
nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 ) except where otherwise stated.
All Eur-lex material used in the work is © European Union,
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/ , 1998–2022.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data
Names: McBride, Mark, 1978- editor. | Penner, J. E. (James E.), editor.
Title: New essays on the nature of legal reasoning / edited by Mark McBride and James Penner.
Description: Oxford, UK ; New York, NY : Hart Publishing, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing, 2022. |
Series: Law and practice reason; volume 14 | “In July 2020, the plan was to host a
workshop on legal reasoning in Singapore, with the aim being to collect and integrate the papers into
a volume … The physical workshop was a casualty of Covid-19, but around that time we did our best to
thrash out some ideas via Zoom.”—ECIP introduction. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2021062199 (print) | LCCN 2021062200 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781509937653 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509958801 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781509937677 (pdf) | ISBN 9781509937660 (Epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Law—Methodology—Congresses.
Classifi cation: LCC K212 .N49 2022 (print) | LCC K212 (ebook) | DDC 340.1—dc23/eng/20220202
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021062199
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021062200
ISBN: HB: 978-1-50993-765-3
ePDF: 978-1-50993-767-7
ePub: 978-1-50993-766-0
Typeset by Compuscript Ltd, Shannon
Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY
To fi nd out more about our authors and books visit w ww.hartpublishing.co.uk . Here you will fi nd
extracts, author information, details of forthcoming events and the option to sign up for our newsletters.
Contents
List of Contributors .....................................................................................vii
Introduction ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������1
Mark McBride and James Penner
PART I
GENERAL JURISPRUDENCE AND LEGAL REASONING
1. On the Relationship between Law and Legal Reasoning ���������������������������5
Frederick Schauer
2. The Law of the Street ����������������������������������������������������������������������������23
Barbara Baum Levenbook
3. Must Legal Reasons Be General? ������������������������������������������������������������45
Fábio Perin Shecaira
4. The Factor Model and General Jurisprudence �����������������������������������������73
Adam Rigoni
PART II
RULES AND REASONS
5. No Reasons �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������99
Mark McBride
6. Revisiting the Reasons Account of Precedent ���������������������������������������113
Grant Lamond
7. Grant Lamond’s Account of Precedent: A Personal Encounter ��������������139
John Horty
8. How to Govern Conduct ���������������������������������������������������������������������161
Larry Alexander and Emily Sherwin
9. Working with a Body of Rules: On the Nature of Doctrinal Legal
Disagreement in Judge-Made Law �������������������������������������������������������175
James Penner
vi Contents
PART III
DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE
10. Thinking Like a Lawyer: An Introduction to Common
Law Method ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������201
Sundram Peter Soosay
11. How the Ideal Adversary System’s Argumentative Structure
Threatens Dignity ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������233
Katharina Stevens and Nicole Lokstadt
12. Lesser Evils, Mere Permissions and Justifying Reasons in Law ��������������259
Rob Mullins
13. First Among Equals: Abduction in Legal Argument from a
Logocratic Point of View ����������������������������������������������������������������������281
Scott Brewer
Index ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������341
List of Contributors
Larry Alexander is Warren Distinguished Professor of Law and Co-Executive
Director of the Institute for Law and Religion at the University of San Diego,
USA.
Scott Brewer is Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, USA.
John Horty is Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Affi liate Professor
in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Maryland, USA.
Grant Lamond is University Lecturer in Legal Philosophy at the University of
Oxford, UK.
Barbara Baum Levenbook is Professor Emerita at the Department of Philosophy
and Religious Studies, North Carolina State University, USA.
Nicole Lokstadt is a doctoral student based at McMaster University, Canada.
Mark McBride is Assistant Professor at the National University of Singapore.
Rob Mullins is Senior Lecturer at the TC Beirne School of Law, University of
Queensland, Australia.
James Penner is Kwa Geok Choo Professor of Property Law at the National
University of Singapore.
Adam Rigoni is Senior Lecturer at Arizona State University, USA.
Fred Schauer is David and Mary Harrison Distinguished Professor of Law at the
University of Virginia, USA.
Fábio Shecaira is Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Law, Federal University of
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Emily Sherwin is Frank B Ingersoll Professor of Law at Cornell Law School,
USA.
Sundram Peter Soosay is an independent scholar.
Katharina Stevens is Assistant Professor at the University of Lethbridge, Canada.

Introduction
MARK MCBRIDE AND JAMES PENNER
W
HILE THERE HAS been a recent burst of interest in the nature of legal
reasoning – which at its core may be taken to involve investigation of
precedent, distinguishing, overruling and reasoning by analogy, but
whose parameters extend far beyond that core – no single volume has brought
together a group of distinguished jurisprudential theorists of legal reasoning.
In July 2020, the plan was to host a workshop on legal reasoning in Singapore,
with the aim being to collect and integrate the papers into a volume (alongside
a small number of other additional contributions from those unable to attend).
The physical workshop was a casualty of Covid-19, but around that time we did
our best to thrash out some ideas via Zoom.
This collection of essays brings together esteemed philosophers, as well as
more junior scholars, to assess critically the nature of legal reasoning. All of the
13 essays are cutting-edge, and none has been published previously.
The volume is divided into three parts. Part I , ‘ General Jurisprudence and
Legal Reasoning ’ , contains four essays, by Fred Schauer, Barbara Levenbook,
Fábio Shecaira and Adam Rigoni. The essays address issues at the intersection
of legal reasoning and general jurisprudence – that branch of the philosophy of
law pertaining to the nature of law itself. While it would be a surprise if these two
topics did not have a rich intersection, it is notable that they are often pursued
independently of one another. More specifi cally, Schauer explores the intersec-
tion between law as a normative order (Kelsen ’ s terminology) and the activities
and decision-making behaviour of lawyers and judges. Levenbook develops a
methodology of creating and testing proposed theories of legal content, and
considers its compatibility with certain positions in general jurisprudence.
Shecaira, meanwhile, interrogates the idea that it is necessarily the case that
legal reasons are general, and also (relatedly) whether judges have an obligation
to ground legal decisions on general reasons. Finally, Rigoni, in an essay that
nicely segues into the second part of the collection, discusses the compatibility
of the so-called reasons model of precedential constraint with various move-
ments in general jurisprudence.
Part II , ‘ Rules and Reasons ’ , contains fi ve essays, by Mark McBride, Grant
Lamond, John Horty, Larry Alexander and Emily Sherwin, and James Penner.
The essays address issues in some sense descending in a level of abstraction from
the fi rst part, and delving into two concepts central to two prominent types of