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In this article my aim is to see Karl Llewellyn as a member of the central pragmatist canon. Further, I see Llewellyn not only as a "Legal Pragmatist," but also as developing a full pragmatist philosophy of law. Reading Llewellyn as a pragmatist would greatly add to an extended understanding of early pragmatism. This would show a strong influence of pragmatic thought within the legal academy.. Second, adding Llewellyn to the pragmatist canon would help show pragmatism in action in the world. Llewellyn might be the central theoretical pragmatist of modern US Law. If, as I believe, pragmatism is a philosophy that depends upon an underlying experimentalist attitude towards philosophizing, given his great influence on US law adding Llewellyn brings a large amount of experimentalist data to the tradition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This introduction to the Special Issue uses the materials presented in the articles contained therein to demonstrate some of the more philosophical challenges for legal change. Importantly too, this article asserts that while finding principles is difficult, there is much, though within sociocultural limits, to be gained in a pragmatic solution. In issue is the matter of providing a second chance for insolvent individuals and small, micro-enterprises, an ancillary pillar to financial inclusion -- the right of people to re-enter credit and finance. Associated with financial inclusion is the need to balance access to credit and finance with the need perceived by some cultures as the ill of over-indebtedness. Comparative law thus sheds light on how different jurisdictions attempt to walk that delicate tight rope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article investigates the transformation within a specific branch of German Salafism from a publicly-assertive da'wa (proselytizing) to a politically accommodating and legal advocacy movement. In doing so, a process analysis that focuses on internal and reflexive narrations among Salafi leaders and lay members, through a three year-long mosque-based ethnography (2018–2021) and textual analysis (2008–2022), is employed. Previous studies focused predominately on the "Salafi growth phase" (2005–2015) in Germany that is associated with the attraction of exclusive group boundaries, flat hierarchies and informal networks. Less research exists on the current "decline phase", which has commenced a re-orientation and critical reflection on past strategies and new ways of civic engagement and legal pragmatism. By exploring this new phase, the article integrates a longitudinal dimension into conventional research protocols on contemporary Salafism. The paper concludes with a discussion on the converging struggles for recognition among Muslim and other religious minorities in Europe, while linking these transformations to domestic opportunity structures rather than transnational reconfigurations of so-called "global Salafism". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy are iconic pieces of literature, but also represent a hugely insightful commentary on the law. Her protagonist, Thomas Cromwell, is the archetype of a philosophical legal pragmatist: willing to use the law and its language to achieve his ends, but regarding adherence to any principled or abstract account of the law as misleading and even dangerous. With striking parallels to the pragmatist philosophy of William James, Richard Rorty, Richard Posner and others, Mantel's Cromwell illustrates both the promise of legal pragmatism—its ability to get results without false compunction about means—but also its dangers: that one may pick the wrong prince, or make flawed or base calculations on how to act. The Wolf Hall trilogy shows this in a manner far more clear and far more vivid than any purely philosophical accounts, and capture something deep about the theory and practice of law. As such, their commentary on the law, authority and governance deserves our close attention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the conducting vote handed down and the bench decision issued by Minister Luís Roberto Barroso, on the occasion of the judgment of Extraordinary Appeal No. 631.240 / MG by the Federal Supreme Court. The work is divided into three parts, the first being the previous application and administrative rejection as a condition of access to justice; then, reflections on the construction of precedents, taking into account the need to promote democratic procedural openness, the precise and adequate wording of the legal thesis and the modulation of its effects; and, finally, there are some aspects of legal pragmatism present in the vote under analysis.

Ronald Dworkin’s interpretivism contains significant elements which might be both regarded as advantages and disadvantages of this legal theory. Among them, the main one is the concept of “theoretical ascent”. He deliberately targets many pragmatist theories, especially in moral and legal philosophy, with the aid of this concept. On the other hand, this concept, overloaded with metaphysical presuppositions, is highly susceptible to well-known pragmatistic criticisms. So, in this essay, I shall follow two main objectives: 1) I would try to remove superfluous, metaphysical assumptions from his legal theory and adjust it finely to everyday practices of judges and lawyers, thereby increasing its practicality; 2) I would try to show that his interpretivism, grounded on the concept of “theoretical ascent”, could better explain the significant contribution of “theorization” to legal practices, compared to pragmatistic explanations, provided it reduces its notorious metaphysical connotations. In other words, I shall argue that an adjustment on both sides in this conflict say, at the parts of legal interpretivism and legal pragmatism, would lead us to a more inclusive legal theory which does better justice to both “theoretical and practical aspects” of legal practices in everyday life.

This paper focuses on the pragmatic dimension of the civil procedure through an interdisciplinary vision within a study of the General Theory of Law, International Law and Civil Procedure, analyzing the effects of international judicial cooperation through the principle of effectiveness and the rule of reciprocity. As for the methodology, it adopts bibliographic and documentary research through the deductive approach method. The study concludes that the principle of effectiveness is a norm that embodies a manifestation of legal pragmatism in the establishing of domestic jurisdiction and a State's international jurisdiction.

This paper examines the changing nature of Muslim political mobilization in contemporary India in the context of Hindu nationalism's ascendancy into power and the consequent crisis of traditional Muslim politics. Through an ethnographic case study of the Popular Front of India, we argue that a qualitatively new form of political mobilization is taking place among Indian Muslims centered on an articulation of "self-defense" against a "Hindu nationalist threat." This politics of self-defense is constructed on the reconciliation of two contradictory processes: use of extensive legal pragmatism, and defensive ethnicization based on Islamic identity. The paper also examines the consequences of the emerging politics of competing ethnicization for even a normative and minimal idea of secularism and how it contributes to the process of decoupling of secularism and democracy in contemporary India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Quaestio Iuris (QI) is the property of Editora da Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (EdUERJ) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In recent years, persistent questions regarding America's role in the world have prompted scholars to revisit the history of World War II and its aftermath, when the foundations of our contemporary international order were arguably laid. Scholarly accounts of the period typically assert that the United States led the way for the establishment of a legalized international order, centered around the norms of international human rights and those of the law of war, and urge that the United States remain true to the same principles in the twenty-first century. More recently, scholars mistrustful of calls for a robust, militarized humanitarian agenda have argued that a much more dismissive attitude toward international law prevailed at the time, in large part due to the reigning influence of international relations realism. Their accounts dovetail with a steadily growing skepticism toward international law in today's foreign policy establishment. This Article argues that postwar foreign policy was defined by neither an unyielding fidelity to a norms-based international order nor an enduring realist dismissal of that project. Rather, what defined the postwar period was an eclectic, variegated and situational approach to law and regulation: a mode of "pragmatic" legalism. Pragmatic legalism consciously developed as a reaction to the legal sensibilities of prewar foreign policymakers, who promoted the codification of international norms and the judicial resolution of international disputes. It also developed as a result of larger transformations in American legal thought, notably the rise of sociological jurisprudence and legal realism. The history of pragmatic legalism reveals the possibilities for renewal in contemporary foreign policy, which currently oscillates between moralizing internationalism and skeptical disengagement. A broader array of legal possibilities is imaginable, including one that evokes the pragmatic spirit. This history also calls attention to the limits of such efforts at renewal. The pragmatic style, once progressive and experimental, eventually helped fuel regressive projects internationally. As in the past, so too today, legal renewal alone can hardly resolve the pressing questions surrounding America's global presence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The origin of the ongoing conflict between the EU and Poland may, according to the author, partly be subscribed to the EU-institutions conceptualization of the rule of law. This conceptualization, which in the article is referred to as "the rule of political liberalism", establishes a particular set of legal institutional and substantial frames and limits for national democratic politics. Granted that the rule of law is an inherently contested concept, the author deconstructs the rule of political liberalism, reveals its weaknesses and ideological bias and proposes an alternative understanding of the rule of law. "The rule of pragmatism" is based on a pragmatic conceptualization of the law, and proscribes a regard for social context and consequences rather than abstract constructions and (good) intention. If applied by the EU institutions, the rule of pragmatism will secure greater legal and political pluralism in Europe and thus contributes to the mending of EU's legitimacy deficit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the possibility that Hobbesian jurisprudence is best understood as a "third way"? in legal theory, irreducible to classical natural law or legal positivism. I sketch two potential "third theories"? of law—legal pragmatism and legal dualism—and argue that, when considered in its broadest sense, Leviathan is best viewed as an example of legal pragmatism. I consider whether this legal pragmatist interpretation can be sustained in the examination of Leviathan's treatment of civil law, and argue that the pragmatic interpretation can only be successful if we can resolve two textual issues in that chapter. First, while Hobbes argues that law entails the existence of public (sharable) reasons, he does not adequately defend the view that the sovereign is the unique authority over such reasons in all cases, especially as far as they concern known collective emergencies. Second, Hobbes both affirms and denies that a sovereign can fail to do justice, which is paradoxical. Both problems are best resolved by legal pragmatism, though the second problem resists a fully satisfying resolution. The upshot is that, although Leviathan ought to be regarded as an episode of legal pragmatism, there are trade-offs on every reading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The phenomenon of judicial supremacy is subjected to criticism of the traditional views on the constitutionalism in the USA. It seems that the clash between the concept of separation of powers on the one hand vs. the role of the courts in interpreting the "invisible constitution" on the other hand still occupies the American scientific community. There is still an impression that it is not ready to propose fundamental changes in the system, so today the judicial supremacy, as a replacement for the judicial review of constitutionality, is considered as the guardian of the Constitution, guardian of the individual rights and guardian of the rights of the minorities. These are basically the values of which no one wants to give up, no matter how much the ambition of the judicial power and its involvement in the political gaps is being criticized. This paper will provide an overview of several theoretical perspectives aimed at conforming judicial review of constitutionality, even though its radical extension in the form of judicial supremacy, judicial activism and judicial paramountcy and the established system of organization of powers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The international human rights system has identified any marriage before the age of 18 as forced marriage or a harmful traditional practice which should be eradicated mainly through legal reform. In many legal systems, the minimum age of marriage is still below 18. In Iran, girls can marry at the age of 13 and boys at the age of 15. Thus, the issue of early marriage has been a point of struggle between the international human rights system and Iran. What is lost in these mainly legal debates is the reality of early marriage. Those who advocate for the eradication of early marriage present a singular perception of such marriage as forced and harmful, while those who oppose the international approach in Iran merely focus on the Islamic roots of the current legislation. In practice, marriage is a complicated social construct. To address early marriage, one should analyse different causes and contexts that influence this institution and determine whether the negative consequences apply in all cases of early marriage. This article argues that the international human rights system should provide a context-sensitive response to early marriage. The human rights discourse is not the only setting for addressing early marriage. The general categorization of early marriage as a violation of human rights fails to recognize various factors that influence the timing of marriage, in particular girls' agency. To effectively address early marriage in Iran, a multidisciplinary approach is necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tolerance has been studied and critiqued extensively in moral and political philosophy. By contrast, we know relatively little about the salience of tolerance to law. In this article, I aim to fill that gap in our knowledge by laying the conceptual groundwork for a pragmatic case for legal tolerance. The article's core arguments are that (i) lawmakers often engage in legal tolerance of contested beliefs, opinions and practices, and (ii) they tend to do so for pragmatic reasons. In building the pragmatic case for legal tolerance, I discuss legal responses in a wide array of jurisdictions and to a broad range of contested moral issues. I also unpack the implications of legal tolerance by analysing its (in)stability and its relationship to state communicative power. I conclude the article by indicating some potential limits of pragmatic legal tolerance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the involvement of Muslim organizations in disseminating political education and legal pragmatism in India. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork between 2011 and 2015, this study contributes to a better theoretical understanding of how Muslim organizations engage in democratic processes, rather than being perceived as opposed to notions of democratic participation, by examining the Popular Front of India's promotion of rights consciousness among its followers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Constitutional Theory is at the center of legal and political debates in the United States. In recent decades, legal scholars and politicians alike increasingly treat their respective theories of interpretation as articles as faith. From originalism, to textualism, to treating the constitution as a "living document," many contend that their theory is better than the others and offers the most suitable answers to raging constitutional debates. This paper tests that popular convention by examining how the Constitution was written, and whether there is indeed any one way to interpret it. I will then compare and contrast two dominant theories of interpretation; Originalism and Legal Pragmatism to show their strengths and weaknesses. Further, I will examine four landmark Supreme Court cases to outline examples of where both theories got it right and wrong. This analysis will reveal that both theories lead to destructive results when presiding judges ignore important political realities of their day and rule based on ideological or theoretical leanings. Conversely, it will show that both theories lead to constructive results when the presiding judges take political realties into account and consider the consequences of their rulings. Thus, the main argument of this paper is that political realities should never be divorced from judicial rulings. This analysis will also show that the political process is integral to sound jurisprudence, and that the constitutional framers left room for this in the way they wrote our most sacred document. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Estudios Filosóficos is the property of Estudios Filosoficos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Estudios Filosóficos is the property of Estudios Filosoficos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Indian Supreme Court faces the challenge of reconciling a long tradition of common law adjudication on administrative matters, with a constitutionally entrenched Bill of Rights. This article examines the Court's jurisprudence on one aspect of judicial review that encapsulates the difficulties this challenge presents: the use of uncodified administrative law "principles of natural justice" in conducting judicial review for violation of constitutional rights. I present the broad claim that the Indian Supreme Court's erratic attempts to incorporate the principles of natural justice into constitutional rights has led to an unpredictable and often erratic form of judicial review. As the distinction between standards of administrative review and constitutional review diminish, leading to a "constitutionalized administrative law," this doctrinal confusion endangers both the consistency of administrative adjudication and the enforcement of fundamental rights. A resolution for this confusion must come from a more thoughtful and consistent jurisprudence by the Court. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A literary criticism is presented of the book "A Realistic Theory of Law" by Professor Tamanaha. It discusses about the sociological jurisprudence of legal pragmatism; theory of law applicable throughout history and across different societies; and connection between social, cultural, and economic, political, and ecological, and technological factors.

A literary criticism is presented of the book "A Realistic Theory of Law" by Professor Tamanaha. It discusses about the sociological jurisprudence of legal pragmatism; theory of law applicable throughout history and across different societies; and connection between social, cultural, and economic, political, and ecological, and technological factors.

A speech is presented by Susan Haack, at a conference on "Exploring Jurisprudence" at Washington University School of Law in honor of the publication of Professor Brian Z. Tamanaha's book "A Realistic Theory of Law." It mentions about history of the pragmatist tradition in philosophy; and an account of Oliver Wendell Holmes's and other legal thinkers' role in this story.

The article discusses the branches of pragmatist legal theory in the U.S. It examines pragmatism, sociological jurisprudence and realism; nature of practical reasoning, and about how judges reason about facts and values; and the book "A Realistic Theory of Law" by Brian Tamanaha on theory of law applicable throughout history and across different societies.

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Copyright of Hacettepe Law Review is the property of Hacettepe Law Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Jürgen Habermas conta-nos que fora influenciado pelo pragmatismo em três domínios de seu desenvolvimento intelectual: na epistemologia, na teoria social e na teoria política. Neste ensaio, gostaria de acrescentar mais um domínio do desenvolvimento intelectual de Habermas no qual igualmente se poderia supor a influência do pragmatismo: a filosofia do direito. A exposição será desenvolvida em duas partes. Na primeira, focalizarei especificamente as contribuições epistemológicas de Charles S. Peirce, pois é neste autor que Habermas foi buscar a base de sua teoria da racionalidade comunicativa. Na segunda, tecerei algumas considerações sobre as influências de Peirce na teoria discursivo-procedimental do direito de Habermas e apresentarei a proposta de Karl-Otto Apel como contraponto heurístico. O tema a ser explorado é a possibilidade de se enquadrar a filosofia do direito de Habermas na tradição do pragmatismo que descende de Peirce. Certamente, a defesa de uma perspectiva filosófica realista no plano da validade normativa coloca o quadro teórico de ambos em linha de continuidade e, ao mesmo tempo, em contraposição às propostas pragmatistas recentes na epistemologia e no direito.Jürgen Habermas tells us that he has been influenced by pragmatism in three areas of his intellectual development: epistemology, social theory, and political theory. In this essay I would like to include a further area of Habermas' intellectual development where one could likewise suppose the influence of pragmatism: the philosophy of Law. The presentation will be divided in two sections. First, I will focus specifically on Charles S. Peirce's epistemological contributions, as it is in this author that Habermas has searched for the basis of his theory of communicative rationality. Second, I will say something about Peirce's influences on Habermas' discursive-theoretical theory of Law, and present Karl-Otto Apel's proposal as a heuristic counterpoint. The theme here explored is the possibility of framing Habermas philosophy of Law in the pragmatist tradition that descends from Peirce. Certainly, the defense of a realist philosophical perspective in terms of normative validity places their theoretical framework in continuity, while at the same time, in conflict with recent pragmatist proposals in epistemology and the Law.

The Supreme Court's general approach to statutory interpretation is analytically incoherent. On the one hand, the Court has expressly endorsed "textualism": enforcing the plain meaning (i.e., ordinary usage) of a statute's words, and therefore refusing to consider non-textual evidence unless the language is unclear. On the other hand, the Court has implicitly applied "pragmatism"--reaching the best practical result after examining not only a statute's text but also Congress's intent (as revealed by legislative history), its overall purposes, precedent, and policy. The two cases upholding the Affordable Care Act (ACA) illustrate this practice of purporting to follow textualism, but then finding seemingly clear words to be ambiguous and consulting a variety of sources to resolve the manufactured ambiguity. First, in King, Justice Scalia made the unassailable textual argument that an ACA provision granting tax credits to those who purchase insurance on a Benefit Exchange established by "State" meant exactly what it said: one of America's fifty governments. A majority of Justices, however, asserted that "State" was unclear and could be read as also extending to the Federal Government. The Court adopted this broader interpretation based on its practical judgment that denying tax credits in the thirty-four States that had Federal Exchanges would cause millions of Americans to forego buying health insurance, which would frustrate the ACA's main purpose and potentially plunge insurance markets into chaos. This construction is defensible as an application of pragmatism, but not the textualist method the Court claimed to be employing. Second, National Federation concerned the ACA "penalty" for violating the individual mandate to purchase health insurance, which Congress had explicitly enacted under its Article I power to regulate interstate commerce--and not its taxing power. Four dissenting Justices applied textualism to conclude that Congress had imposed a "penalty," which has long had a single definition: "a monetary punishment for violating a regulatory law." Because the dissenters and Chief Justice Roberts agreed that Congress lacked power under the Commerce Clause to regulate inactivity (penalizing the failure to buy health insurance), the mandate should have been declared unconstitutional. Unexpectedly, however, Roberts joined his four liberal colleagues in maintaining that the term "penalty" was ambiguous and could possibly mean "tax"--a word that had always previously been defined as "an enforced contribution to support the government" and distinguished from a "penalty." This bizarre interpretation enabled the Court to reach its desired practical result of salvaging the mandate under Congress's constitutional power to tax. To compound the confusion, the Justices routinely invoke many specific "canons" of construction, which feature malleable standards that can easily be manipulated. For instance, in National Federation, the Court cited the canon that statutes should be read, where reasonable, to avoid constitutional issues in order to rationalize its tortured interpretation of "penalty"as "tax." King and National Federation are merely the most notable examples of a pervasive problem: unbridled discretion in construing statutes. Unfortunately, the Court has little practical incentive to change because (1) most statutes are of interest only to a small group, (2) Americans pay little attention to statutory interpretation, and (3) even unpopular individual rulings do not affect the public's overall high opinion of the Court. Nonetheless, respect for the rule of law and intellectual integrity should induce the Court to develop a more principled jurisprudence. The optimal solution would be for the Court to adopt and apply textualism as its basic interpretive approach, to clearly acknowledge when exceptional circumstances pragmatically persuade it to depart from that approach, and to deemphasize canons of construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The long-running debate between originalism and competing accounts o f the Constitution has unfolded with little attention to classic American jurisprudential concepts o f legal positivism and legal pragmatism. In this syncretic article, / explore how these jurisprudential and theoretical strands fit together. 1 also explore several lessons we can learn about legal positivism and legal pragmatism and one critical lesson we can learn about the debate about originalism, if we contextualize the debate over originalism in that part o f the space o f reasons. First, positivist and natural law originalisms are substantially similar in their substantive constitutional content. Originalism critics—both those who embrace positivism and those who embrace natural law—similarly share substantially congruent substantive criticisms o f originalism. These parallels raise an important question about the significance o f the distinction between legal positivism and natural law. The debate over originalism shows that the opposition between legal positivism and natural law may be less interesting or important than it is generally taken to be. Second, the fundamental difference between originalism— which, in relevant part, defends a deontological account o f constitutional law—and its consequentialist pragmatist critics provides another argument why the debate about originalism cannot be resolved on its own terms. I have previously argued that sophisticated philosophical premises make the originalism debate pathological rather than fruitful. But those arguments are quite highfalutin. This article provides another argument for the fruitlessness o f the debate. Without common grounds between the protagonists as to the place o f consequences in constitutional decision process, a resolution o f the more particular issues in the debate over originalism cannot be hoped for or expected. But as we contextualize the originalism debate we may understand why it is a dead end in our constitutional theory and, more importantly, in our constitutional decision process. It is a dead end because the two sides in the debate have inconsistent theories o f the nature o f constitutional law. With a better understanding o f how the debate fits in with other parts o f our constitutional jurisprudence, we may leave the debate behind in our continuing constitutional discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ronald Dworkin was an outspoken critic of pragmatism, and engaged in extensive and at times virulent disagreements with Richard Posner and Richard Rorty. Yet, I argue here, that Dworkin himself had a number of deeply pragmatist commitments. I examine how we can square these two aspects of Dworkin’s thought. I suggest that part of the answer lies in seeing that there are different strands of pragmatism, and that Dworkin falls on the more objective, Peircean side of the divide, while Rorty and Posner belong more in the skeptical, Jamesian camp. But even with this distinction in mind, we should note the substantial overlap between the views of Dworkin and his pragmatist interlocutors—in particular, their anti-archimedeanism and their rejection of metaphysics. Attentiveness to this shared perspective is helpful in illuminating Dworkin’s disagreements with legal positivists. The more foundational divide, I argue, is between analytic legal philosophers who aim to provide an account of the metaphysics of law, and those, like Dworkin and the pragmatists, who reject such a project. I conclude by discussing the implications of Dworkin’s pragmatism for legal philosophy. I argue that it may lead to what some have recently called ‘eliminativism’, and engage with some new and prominent work on this current topic in legal philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper aims at justifying an interpretation of Dworkin's theory of Law as Integrity that brings it closer to philosophical pragmatism despite his rejection of legal pragmatism. In order to achieve this aim, this work employs a classification of philosophical commitments that define pragmatism in a broad and in a narrow sense and shows that legal pragmatism follows the main thinkers of pragmatism in the narrow sense in committing to instrumentalism. The attribution of a pragmatist character to Dworkin's theory of law rests on the idea that the adoption of a commitment to instrumentalism is not implicated by its adoption of other pragmatist commitments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When discussing O. W. Holmes's answer to the question What constitutes the law? Morton White underlines the fact that Holmes's inquiry didn't focus on developing the concept of law. White states: '...Holmes said little in The Path of the Law about the notion of legal authority, perhaps because he was interested not in what he called a "useless quintessence of all legal systems" but in "an accurate anatomy of one"'. Such ambition (or lack of ambition) is characteristic of many pragmatic enterprises in the field of jurisprudence. However, sometimes the opposition between legal pragmatism and other legal theories is built upon a reference to the notion of the 'nature' or 'essence' of law. Many legal philosophers who aim to reveal the very 'nature of law' (or 'the concept of law' as H. L. A. Hart did) try to interpret Holmes and other pragmatists as offering a competitive view to their own. I will follow White's early intuition that such a construal of the controversy is simply wrong. Afterwards I will sketch a portrait of legal pragmatism in the context of White's own inquiry and his version of 'holistic pragmatism'; thirdly, I will present in brief the main reasons for exploring the concept of law in the contemporary analytic philosophy of law. Then I will show that traditionally 'pragmatic' and 'analytic' efforts in legal theory are situated on different levels of generality and conceptuality. However, these efforts can be, at least to some extent, reordered under the aegis of holistic pragmatism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses ambiguity and legal pragmatism in relation to the potential admission of extrinsic evidence in the insurance policy interpretation process in Australia as of 2015. Commercial contracts are addressed, along with the 1982 Australian legal case Codelfa Construction Pty Ltd. v. State Rail Authority (NSW) which deals with a true rule regarding the admissibility of extrinsic evidence in contractual interpretation. English courts and Australia's High Court are examined.

The article discusses the concepts of legal formalism and pragmatism in relation to the reconsideration of a ban on the use of extrinsic evidence to prove impeaching and untruthful acts that have not resulted in convictions in America. Trials in the U.S. are addressed, along with disputes about witness credibility and America's Federal Rules of Evidence. The legal aspects of witnesses and trial testimony are examined, as well as cross-examinations and various legal cases in the U.S.

The theoretical explanation of legitimacy of the legal institutions includes two paths of formalism and pragmatism. Legal pragmatism can well illustrate the juristic basis of reviewing the necessity of detention coercive measures. The substance of this system is the review of the necessity and justice basis for detention coercive measure by neutral judicial officer so as to limit the application of detention measures and to pay more attention to individual justice while achieving general justice. The newly revised Criminal Procedure Law has stipulated the review mechanism of the necessity for detention, but more principles and concreted contents should be further refined in order to make the legal provision more feasible in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an overview of the 1821 trials of the African American John Reed for charges of murder and allegations of being a fugitive slave in Kennett Township, Pennsylvania. Details are given outlining the context and circumstances surrounding Reed's imprisonment after his failed capture by Maryland slave owner Samuel Griffith, the pragmatic legal strategies of abolitionists in Pennsylvania with regard to confronting slave law, and in-depth accounts of the proceedings of the trials.