The following appeared in Volume 98, Number 1 (Fall, 1998) of the APA Newsletters

First, my thanks to John Kleinig (John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York) for the great work he has done guest editing this issue of the Newsletter, which is devoted to problems relating to the loyalties of lawyers. In addition to the article he wrote himself and the related bibliography he has compiled, Professor Kleinig has also secured contributions from Michael McChrystal, Richard Bronaugh, and Sanford Levinson. I’ve added a summary of a relevant symposium issue from the Michigan Law Review, as well as a couple of abstracts of law review articles relevant to this issue’s topic (see abstracts of articles by Paul Rice and Stephen Pepper).

In addition, I want to acknowledge help from Larry May (Philosophy, Washington University) and David Goldberg (Law, Arizona State) in drafting some of the law review abstracts for this issue of the Newsletter. Finally, readers should note that Stephan Baumrin, of Lehman College in the City University of New York, assumed chairmanship of the APA’s Committee on Philosophy and Law this past July, for a three-year term.

Topics and topic editors for the next pair of issues of the Newsletter are as follows:

Richard Nunan
Department of Philosophy & Religious Studies
College of Charleston
Charleston, SC 29424
nunanr@cofc.edu
(803) 953-6522

The editors of the newsletters on Philosophy and the Black Experience and Philosophy and Law are pleased to announce a joint issue devoted to Critical Race Theory.

This body of scholarly literature is in part an outgrowth of the Critical Legal Studies attack on the rights-based discourse of traditional liberal legal theory, and in part a reaction against the abstract level at which that critique is conducted. CLS has successfully drawn attention to the extent to which liberal advocacy of purportedly universal human and civil rights has often masked and promoted various parochially economic and class-based political motivations. But Critical Race theorists contend that most CLS scholars have conducted this debate at the same level of abstraction as their liberal targets, failing on the one hand to appreciate the practical usefulness of rights rhetoric for minorities seeking real advances in equal citizenship through strategies of legal intervention, and failing on the other hand to recognize the full extent to which abstract conceptions of rights have been merely formal. To communicate both of these problems more effectively, Critical Race scholars often abandon the universal voice of conventional legal theory in favor of narrative writing in a first- or third-person voice, a strategy they share with some feminist legal theorists, and with those who write about sexual orientation and the law.

In light of the current push to use traditional liberal rhetoric about purely formal "objectively neutral" rights of equal opportunity as a theoretical excuse to dismantle affirmative action programs at both state and federal levels (e.g., appeals to the ideal of a color-blind meritocracy), a review of the perspective developed through Critical Race theory seems especially timely. Articles or inquiries may be submitted to either of the editors.

Submission Deadline: June 15, 1999
Editor: William Edmundson
College of Law
Georgia State University
P.O. Box 4037
Atlanta, GA 30302-4037
wedmundson@gsu.edu

The question, "Why should I obey the law?" introduces a puzzle as old as antiquity. The puzzle (often referred to as "the problem of political obligation") is especially troublesome if we think of cases in which breaking the law is not otherwise wrongful, and in which the chances of getting caught are negligible. Philosophers from Socrates to H.L.A. Hart have struggled to give reasoned support to the thought that we do have a general moral duty to obey the law but, more recently, the greater number of learned voices has expressed doubt that there is any such duty, not even a prima facie one. Doubt here calls into question the nature of authority and the very possibility of a legitimate state. This issue will be devoted to the duty to obey the law, its nature, its existence, and its role in legal and political philosophy.

Finally, since a number of recent issues have been devoted to specific topics, it seems appropriate to schedule an open issue for a change, for the purpose of encouraging broader participation from the readers of this newsletter:

Submission Deadline: December 15, 1999
Editor: Richard Nunan (See Spring ‘99 notice for address)

If you are interested in submitting an article to be considered for inclusion in one of the forthcoming issues, it would be prudent to send an inquiry in advance, briefly describing your proposed topic. Space is very tight in the Newsletter, and there is room for only a few articles in each issue. Since the Newsletter aims for broad coverage of the range of issues relevant to a particular topic, it is unlikely that two articles which treat of the same subtopic will be published. Advance inquiries will also enable guest editors to furnish prospective contributors with more detailed information about the formatting requirements for submissions. In any event, authors should restrict their contributions to 3,000-4,000 words (about 12 pages, double-spaced).