Morality, Justice, and the Law ― The Continuing Debate

Darmer (Chapman University School of Law) and Baird (philosophy, Baylor University) have collected a number of previously published essays that demonstrate the uneasy relationship of personal belief systems and our legal codes. The perennial debate on this is demonstrated in the first essay, an 1897 article by Oliver Wendell Holmes. The collection is grouped in themes of law and morality in general, religion and the practice of secular law, the prosecution (or not) of civil disobedience, capital punishment and finally the knotty problem of illegal immigration. There are also two transcripts of Supreme Court decisions. All the articles are accessible to the general reader although the book may be intended for classroom use. Annotation c2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

M. Katherine B. Darmer (Anaheim, CA) is professor of law at the Chapman University School of Law and formerly an Assistant United States Attorney in New York, NY. She is the coeditor (with Robert M. Baird and Stuart E. Rosenbaum) of Civil Liberties vs. National Security in a Post-9/11 World and the coeditor (with Robert M. Baird) of Homosexuality: Debating the Issues.
Robert M. Baird (Waco, TX) is a professor and the former chair of the philosophy department at Baylor University. He is co-series editor with Stuart E. Rosenbaum of Prometheus’s Contemporary Issues series.