Natural Law: A Libertarian View
Northwestern Public Law Research Paper No. 08-03
FIU Law Review, Forthcoming
23 Pages Posted: 17 Mar 2008 Last revised: 6 May 2008
Date Written: May 2, 2008
Abstract
What follows from the following two propositions? Legal positivism views law as a command writ large. The commander is the person or group with the most power. Answer: this pernicious mind-set is responsible for our abandonment of personal liberty. For there can be no limit to the imagination and will power of the commander. The plenary jurisdiction of the commander paves the way for Big Government to move in and regulate every aspect of our lives and our privacy. The world wasn't always like this. Prior to the servility that positivism has induced, there was a now-forgotten secular natural law that was inherently limited to the needs of society and had no power beyond the outer edge of a person's zone of privacy.
Keywords: natural law, legal positivism, privacy, libertarianism
JEL Classification: K10
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation