In my last post, Religious Restraint and Public Policy: Part I, I set out the doctrine of religious restraint and touched on some criticisms of it. In this post, I begin looking at and critiquing some of the key arguments in support of the doctrine of religious restraint. II Arguments for the Doctrine of Religious […]
Entries Tagged as 'Jurisprudence'
Religious Restraint and Public Policy: Part II
November 24th, 2009 2 Comments
Tags: Christopher Eberle · Doctrine of Religious Restraint · Freedom of Religion · John Rawls · Jurisprudence · Law Studies · Lydia McGrew · Matthew Flannagan · Nicholas Wolterstorff · Philosophy of Religion · Political Philosophy · Public Policy · Religion in Public Life · Robert Audi
Religious Restraint and Public Policy: Part I
November 23rd, 2009 31 Comments
In this series I set out the doctrine of religious restraint, the idea that in a pluralistic, liberal, society religious beliefs should not be utilised in the formation of public policy. I note that this doctrine entails an asymmetrical treatment of religious and secular beliefs, which appears to conflict with the central notion of liberal […]
Tags: Christopher Eberle · Doctrine of Religious Restraint · Freedom of Religion · Jurisprudence · Law Studies · Nicholas Wolterstorff · Philip Quinn · Philosophy of Religion · Political Philosophy · Public Policy · Religion in Public Life · Stephen Carter · Terence Cuneo
The Foreshore and Seabed Repeal: The Inconvenience of Due Process
July 2nd, 2009 14 Comments
That the state is not above the law but also subject to it is surely one of the foundational concepts of any just and free society. This notion has found its place in the writings of many influential philosophers, jurists and theologians, it can be found in the constitutions and bills of rights of most […]
Tags: Foreshore and Seabed · Human Rights · Jurisprudence · Justice · Liberty · Māori Land · Ngāti Apa
David Bain 111 Call "I Shot the Prick" – Court Decisions Available Online UPDATED AGAIN
June 11th, 2009 3 Comments
Did David Bain tell the 111 operator “I shot the prick” on discovering the dead bodies of his family? This evidence was originally suppressed “until completion of the re-trial” as, per Wilson J, The probative value of the disputed sounds is very modest, but the risk of prejudice resulting from their introduction into the trial […]
Tags: Jurisprudence · Justice
Three Strikes: Proportion and Protection
March 6th, 2009 12 Comments
The Attorney General has identified an “apparent inconsistency” with the proposed “3 strikes bill” and the New Zealand Bill of Rights. This inconsistency is around whether the punishment inflicted by the 3rd strike would be “disproportionately severe.” There have been various reactions to this; the most extreme I have heard came from the bill’s proponent […]
Tags: Jurisprudence · Justice
Maori and Pakeha are Not Partners to the Treaty of Waitangi
February 11th, 2009 20 Comments
[For the benefit of our international readership: Maori are the indigenous people of New Zealand; Pakeha is a term used to describe Caucasian New Zealanders; The Treaty of Waitangi is a significant founding document of our nation over which many historical and current differences have arisen around its role, interpretation and application.] Recently I read […]
Tags: Jurisprudence · Role of the State · Treaty of Waitangi
In Defence of the Defence
November 23rd, 2008 2 Comments
Michael Laws has written a strong piece in the Sunday Star times on child abuse which pulls no punches and calls for a return of the death penalty. Most of what he says is spot on (well there is a bit of the ‘someone else should be doing something’ going on) but this statement is […]
Tags: Child Abuse · Due Process · Human Rights · Jurisprudence · Michael Laws · Nia Glassie
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.
