Limits of the Law

A propos of nothing in particular, I should like to muse a little on the limits of law. Let me preface this by two quotations which together represent my own attitude toward the law. The first is from Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons: ‘‘more: [Would you] cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that! more: And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you—where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast—man’s laws, not God’s—and if you cut them down d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of the law, for my own safety’s sake.” The second quotalion is from Heraclitus: “For all human laws are nourished by one, which is divine.” These two encompass for me the aspects of the law that command my deep allegiance: the human protection of procedure, and the divine majesty of the law’s substance.

We are talking here not of speculative thoughts but of rules having effect and respect in human society. It is an observable fact that legal rules apply within certain limits and that beyond those limits, not only effectiveness but also validity is doubtful.

GN

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Gerhart Niemeyer

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Constitutional Government

A propos of nothing in particular, I should like to muse a little on the limits of law. Let me preface this by two quotations which together represent my own attitude toward the law. The first is from Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons: ‘‘more: [Would you] cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that! more: And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you—where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast—man’s laws, not God’s—and if you cut them down d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of the law, for my own safety’s sake.” The second quotalion is from Heraclitus: “For all human laws are nourished by one, which is divine.” These two encompass for me the aspects of the law that command my deep allegiance: the human protection of procedure, and the divine majesty of the law’s substance.

We are talking here not of speculative thoughts but of rules having effect and respect in human society. It is an observable fact that legal rules apply within certain limits and that beyond those limits, not only effectiveness but also validity is doubtful.