uspublicpolicy.blogspot.com Many of the most troubling moral and political issues that we face are addressed in our society as legal issues. An acquaintance with the law, an awareness of some of the more important legal decisions that have been made in the last few years tells us more about ourselves than almost any other American institution or practice. Public debate about surrogate motherhood, capital punishment, hate speech, euthanasia, the electoral process and equaltiy between the sexes is waged in terms of legal principle and acted out in our courts. Philosophy of Law (PHIL 22B) reflects the conviction that the law, when it is studied in relation to fundamental social issues, is one of the most fascinating subjects to which we can be exposed. It is also a subject about which most of us already have intuitions. There is great joy (and often relief) in the discovery that an outcome in a given case or line of reasoning adopted by a judge to explain that outcome captures one of our own (not always fully articulated) opinions. Each section of Philosophy of Law is organized around a controversial issue that raises important questions for which there are often more than one good answer. Indeed, each segment raises more questions than it answers. This is not intended to frustrate but to provoke thought, and to encourage anyone who elects to pursue a career in Law to develop a clearer idea of their own values and beliefs and to provide them with the means and the confidence ...