Book picks similar to
Justice in Transactions: A Theory of Contract Law by Peter Benson
law
laws
legal-theory
private-law
My Life
David Lange - 2005
His Labour government introduced sweeping new legislation that unchained the country from its old conservative bonds, established the world's first nuclear free state and let loose a free market economic agenda that radically transformed the country. It was a rapid climb to the very top for the overweight doctor's son from working class South Auckland. As leader during the final years of the Cold War he confronted the agendas of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and lived through the political upheavals of the fall of the Soviet Union, post-apartheid South Africa and Rajiv Ghandi's India. Along the way he memorably defeated the Reverend Jerry Falwell in a famous Oxford Union debate about the morality and sanity of the nuclear arms race, and negotiated the aftermath of the tragic bombing of the Rainbow Warrior by French agents in Auckland harbour.
The Prosecutors: A Year in the Life of a District Attorney's Office
Gary Delsohn - 2003
Allowed unprecedented access to spend a year inside an urban prosecutors' office, Gary Delsohn provides a riveting, behind-the-scenes look at how America's increasingly overburdened judicial system really functions. Seen through the eyes of the main characters in this true-life drama-John O'Mara, a tough, jaded homicide chief and Jan Scully, an accomplished former sex-crimes prosecutor who is now the D.A.-The Prosecutors shows us these dedicated public servants at work. The cases they encounter within this one year are as shocking as they are indelible: * A simple robbery in Sacramento, California, goes bad and shatters a family forever. * A serial killer is caught only after a nationwide manhunt. * A well-respected doctor is accused of murdering his own daughter. * A twenty-five-year-old cold case involving Patty Hearst and the SLA explodes and brings incredible pressure and scrutiny to the D.A.'s office. * The son of a high-ranking California state prosecutor faces a possible death penalty for kidnap, rape,and murder. The Prosecutors chronicles the real-life legal dramas that are waged daily in our courtrooms. It is a book that enlightens, educates, entertains, and even infuriates at times with the miscarriages of justice, but, ultimately, shows in stark detail the intricacies that make our legal system work.
Memoirs Of A Radical Lawyer
Michael Mansfield - 2009
Unafraid of rejection or failure, Michael has taken on the most difficult and challenging cases of our times and despite the odds, won plenty. In Memoirs of a Radical Lawyer Michael dissects many of them, revealing his motivations, meticulous approach to forensic science, cross examination techniques, the political dimensions and emotional reactions with clarity, subtlety and charm. Interspersed with personal anecdotes and recollections, this insightful book is liberally laced with Michael's quirky brand of anarchic humour. Cases range from the Angry Brigade, the Bradford 12, the Birmingham Six, the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, Angela Cannings, Jill Dando, Ruth Ellis, Dodi Fayed, the 'Fertilizer' conspiracy, Iraqi hi-jackers, Stephen Lawrence, Fatmir Limaj (Leader of the Kosovan Liberation Army), the Marchioness Disaster, the Price sisters, the 'Ricin' trial, Risley prison riots, Tahira Tabassum, Judith Ward, Arthur Scargill and the miners to the Jean Charles de Menezes inquiry, and many more. Issues of public concern, human rights and innovative attempts to construct a democratic legal system are discussed in full, but Memoirs of a Radical Lawyer also unveils with honesty and wit a man who has put as much passion and energy into his life as his work, one of the great personalities of our time.
Employment Law for Business
Dawn D. Bennett-Alexander - 1997
It is intended to instruct students on how to manage effectively and efficiently with full comprehension of the legal ramifications of their decisions. Students are shown how to analyze employment law facts using concrete examples of management-related legal dilemmas that do not present clear-cut solutions. The methods of arriving at resolutions are emphasized, so that when the facts of the workplace problem are not quite the same, the student can still reach a good decision based on the legal considerations required by law, which remain relevant.
Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George W. Bush
John Yoo - 2010
To protect national security, he invokes his powers as Commander-in-Chief and orders actions that seem to violate laws enacted by Congress. He is excoriated for usurping dictatorial powers, placing himself above the law, and threatening to “breakdown constitutional safeguards.” One could be forgiven for thinking that the above describes former President George W. Bush. Yet these particular attacks on presidential power were leveled against Franklin D. Roosevelt. They could just as well describe similar attacks leveled against George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln and a number of other presidents challenged with leading the nation through times of national crisis. However bitter, complex, and urgent today’s controversies over executive power may be, John Yoo reminds us they are nothing new. In Crisis and Command, he explores a factor too little consulted in current debates: the past. Through shrewd and lucid analysis, he shows how the bold decisions made by Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, and FDR changed more than just history; they also transformed the role of the American president. The link between the vigorous exercise of executive power and presidential greatness, Yoo argues, is both significant and misunderstood. He makes the case that the founding fathers deliberately left the Constitution vague on the limits of presidential authority, drawing on history to demonstrate the benefi ts to the nation of a strong executive office.
The Bramble Bush: The Classic Lectures on the Law and Law School
Karl N. Llewellyn - 1953
That book is The Bramble Bush. After all these years and many imitators, The Bramble Bush remains one of the most popular introductions to the law and its study.Llewellyn introduces students to what the law is, how to read cases, how to prepare for class, and how justice in the real world relates to the law. Although laws change every year, disputes between people haven't altered all that much since Llewellyn first penned The Bramble Bush, and the processof moving from private dispute to legal conflict still follows the patterns he described.Moreover, the steps of a legal dispute, from arguments to verdict, to opinion, to review, to appeal, to opinion have changed little in their significance or their substance. Cases are still the best tools for exploring the interaction of the law with individual questions, and the essence of what lawstudents must learn to do has persisted. If anything, many of the points Llewellyn argued in these lectures were on the dawning horizon then but are in their mid-day fullness now.
The Idea of Justice
Amartya Sen - 2009
And in this book the distinguished scholar Amartya Sen offers a powerful critique of the theory of social justice that, in its grip on social and political thinking, has long left practical realities far behind.The transcendental theory of justice, the subject of Sen's analysis, flourished in the Enlightenment and has proponents among some of the most distinguished philosophers of our day; it is concerned with identifying perfectly just social arrangements, defining the nature of the perfectly just society. The approach Sen favors, on the other hand, focuses on the comparative judgments of what is "more" or "less" just, and on the comparative merits of the different societies that actually emerge from certain institutions and social interactions.At the heart of Sen's argument is a respect for reasoned differences in our understanding of what a "just society" really is. People of different persuasions--for example, utilitarians, economic egalitarians, labor right theorists, no--nonsense libertarians--might each reasonably see a clear and straightforward resolution to questions of justice; and yet, these clear and straightforward resolutions would be completely different. In light of this, Sen argues for a comparative perspective on justice that can guide us in the choice between alternatives that we inevitably face.
Justice as Fairness: A Restatement
John Rawls - 2001
In time the lectures became a restatement of his theory of justice as fairness, revised in light of his more recent papers and his treatise Political Liberalism (1993). As Rawls writes in the preface, the restatement presents "in one place an account of justice as fairness as I now see it, drawing on all [my previous] works." He offers a broad overview of his main lines of thought and also explores specific issues never before addressed in any of his writings.Rawls is well aware that since the publication of A Theory of Justice in 1971, American society has moved farther away from the idea of justice as fairness. Yet his ideas retain their power and relevance to debates in a pluralistic society about the meaning and theoretical viability of liberalism. This book demonstrates that moral clarity can be achieved even when a collective commitment to justice is uncertain.
Against Intellectual Property
N. Stephan Kinsella - 2001
Stephan Kinsella has caused libertarians worldwide to rethink the very basis of intellectual property.Mises warned against patents, and so did Rothbard. But Kinsella goes much further. He argues that the very existence of patents — and copyrights and trademarks, too — is contrary to a free market. They all use the state to create artificial scarcities of nonscarce goods and employ coercion in a way that is contrary to property rights and the freedom of contract.Many who read this book will be unprepared for the rigor of Kinsella's argument. It takes time to settle in, simply because it seems so shocking at first. But Kinsella makes his case with powerful logic and examples that are overwhelming in their persuasive power.After all, the relevance of this argument in a digital age can't be overstated. The state works with monopolistic private producers to inhibit innovation and stop the progress of technology, while using coercion against possible competitors and against consumers. Even US foreign policy is profoundly affected by widespread confusions over what is legitimate and what is merely asserted as property.What Kinsella is calling for instead of this cartelizing system is nothing more or less than a pure free market, which involves nothing resembling what we call intellectual property today. IP, he argues, is really nothing more than a state-enforced legal convention, not an extension of real ownership.Few books written in the last decades have caused so much fundamental rethinking. It is essential that libertarians get this issue right and understand the arguments on all sides. Kinsella's book is masterful in doing just that — making a case against IP that turns out to be more rigorous and thorough than any written on the left, right, or anywhere in between.Read it and prepare to change your mind.To search for Mises Institute titles, enter a keyword and LvMI (short for Ludwig von Mises Institute); e.g., Depression LvMI
Murdered by Mumia: A Life Sentence of Loss, Pain, and Injustice
Maureen Faulkner - 2007
Mumia Abu-Jamal was unanimously convicted of the crime by a racially mixed jury based on: the testimony of several eyewitnesses, his ownership of the murder weapon, matching ballistics, and Abu-Jamal’s own confession.After his conviction, however, a national anti-death penalty movement was started to “Free Mumia;” Mike Farrell, Ed Asner, Whoopi Goldberg, and Jesse Jackson rallied on his behalf, and led the charge. For his part, while on death row, Abu-Jamal published several books, delivered radio commentaries, was a college commencement speaker, found himself named an Honorary Citizen of France, and had his defense coffers enhanced by ticket sales from a sold out (16,000-person) concert featuring Rage Against the Machine.Here, from Maureen Faulkner and acclaimed talk show host / journalist Michael Smerconish, is the first book to carefully and definitively lay out the case against Abu-Jamal, and those who’ve elevated him to the status of political prisoner. Smerconish, a lawyer, has provided pro bono legal counsel to Faulkner for over a decade and knows both the legal intricacies and personal subtleties of the case like no other person. He’s personally acquainted himself with the more than five thousand pages of trial transcript. “My reading starkly revealed that Abu-Jamal murdered Danny Faulkner in cold blood and that the case tried in Philadelphia in 1982 bore no resemblance to the one being home-cooked by the Abu-Jamal defense team.”As Abu-Jamal’s lawyers contemplate their final appeal, Faulkner and Smerconish weave a compelling, never-before-told account of one fateful night and the 25-year-long rewriting of history.
The Firm, the Market, and the Law
Ronald H. Coase - 1988
Coase has been, even though, as he admits, "most economists have a different way of looking at economic problems and do not share my conception of the nature of our subject." Coase's particular interest has been that part of economic theory that deals with firms, industries, and markets—what is known as price theory or microeconomics. He has always urged his fellow economists to examine the foundations on which their theory exists, and this volume collects some of his classic articles probing those very foundations. "The Nature of the Firm" (1937) introduced the then-revolutionary concept of transaction costs into economic theory. "The Problem of Social Cost" (1960) further developed this concept, emphasizing the effect of the law on the working of the economic system. The remaining papers and new introductory essay clarify and extend Coarse's arguments and address his critics."These essays bear rereading. Coase's careful attention to actual institutions not only offers deep insight into economics but also provides the best argument for Coase's methodological position. The clarity of the exposition and the elegance of the style also make them a pleasure to read and a model worthy of emulation."—Lewis A. Kornhauser, Journal of Economic LiteratureRonald H. Coase was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Science in 1991.
The Rights of War and Peace
Hugo Grotius - 1625
However, in the seventeeth century and during the Enlightenment, it was considered a major defense of the rights of states and private persons to use their power to secure themselves and their property.Book I examines the question of whether any war is just and who may lawfully make war. The causes of war; the implications of contracts, oaths, and promises; and the moral strictures of punishments are the subjects of Book II. The third book discusses what is lawful in war, the various kinds of peace and agreements given, and the treatment and ransoming of prisoners.The Liberty Fund edition is based on the classic English text of 1738, with extensive commentary by Jean Barbeyrac. It also includes the Prolegomena to the first edition, a document never before translated into English.Hugo Grotius is one of the most important thinkers in the early-modern period. A great humanistic polymath—lawyer and legal theorist, diplomat and political philosopher, ecumenical activist and theologian—his work was seminal for modern natural law and influenced the moral, political, legal, and theological thought of the Enlightenment, from Hobbes, Pufendorf, and Locke to Rousseau and Kant, as well as America’s Founding leaders.Richard Tuck is a Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, and Professor of Government at Harvard University.Knud Haakonssen is Professor of Intellectual History and Director of the Centre for Intellectual History at the University of Sussex, England.
The Harm in Hate Speech
Jeremy Waldron - 2012
For constitutionalists, regulation of hate speech violates the First Amendment and damages a free society. Against this absolutist view, Jeremy Waldron argues powerfully that hate speech should be regulated as part of our commitment to human dignity and to inclusion and respect for members of vulnerable minorities.Causing offense--by depicting a religious leader as a terrorist in a newspaper cartoon, for example--is not the same as launching a libelous attack on a group's dignity, according to Waldron, and it lies outside the reach of law. But defamation of a minority group, through hate speech, undermines a public good that can and should be protected: the basic assurance of inclusion in society for all members. A social environment polluted by anti-gay leaflets, Nazi banners, and burning crosses sends an implicit message to the targets of such hatred: your security is uncertain and you can expect to face humiliation and discrimination when you leave your home.Free-speech advocates boast of despising what racists say but defending to the death their right to say it. Waldron finds this emphasis on intellectual resilience misguided and points instead to the threat hate speech poses to the lives, dignity, and reputations of minority members. Finding support for his view among philosophers of the Enlightenment, Waldron asks us to move beyond knee-jerk American exceptionalism in our debates over the serious consequences of hateful speech.
How To Be A Landlord: The Definitive Guide to Letting and Managing Your Rental Property
Rob Dix - 2017
By the author of the UK’s most popular property book, The Complete Guide To Property Investment. Please note that this book only covers letting and management of a property you already own. For a guide to buying the right property in the first place, you should buy ‘The Complete Guide To Property Investment’. Take a property, throw in a tenant and watch the money roll in. This seemingly simple formula has attracted nearly two million people in the UK to become landlords, but the reality is a whole lot more complicated. Did you know, for example, that if you forget to provide a certain piece of paper you might be unable to evict a tenant – even if they don’t pay the rent? Or that you could be fined for not checking your tenant’s immigration status? And don’t forget the inevitable broken boilers, mysterious leaks and various tenant complaints that always seem to happen at the most inconvenient time. How To Be A Landlord is a straightforward guide to everything involved in letting and managing a property – whether you’re an accidental landlord or an enthusiastic investor. In simple and entertaining language, it covers important steps like preparing the property to let, advertising for tenants, conducting viewings, doing all the paperwork, managing the tenancy, and dealing with any tricky situations that crop up (including the dreaded emergency repairs and evictions…). You’ll learn: • How to set yourself up for success when preparing a property to let • Where to find the perfect tenants for your property • The essential checks you must make to avoid a nightmare tenant • Everything you need to do when setting up a tenancy to avoid problems later • How to deal with the most common maintenance issues and repairs • The proper legal processes to follow when you have troublesome tenants • Top tips from experienced landlords for how to look after your tenants – keeping them happy, your property safe, and the rent rolling in Frequently updated and with contributions from over 50 experienced landlords, this is the most current and comprehensive book on the subject – and essential reading for anyone who wants a simple, profitable life as a landlord.
The Myth of Ownership: Taxes and Justice
Liam Murphy - 2002
Taxes arouse strong passions, fueled not only by conflicts of economic self-interest, but by conflicting ideas of fairness. Taking as a guiding principle the conventional nature of private property, Murphy and Nagel show how taxes can only be evaluated as part of the overall system of property rights that they help to create. Justice or injustice in taxation, they argue, can only mean justice or injustice in the system of property rights and entitlements that result from a particular regime. Taking up ethical issues about individual liberty, interpersonal obligation, and both collective and personal responsibility, Murphy and Nagel force us to reconsider how our tax policy shapes our system of property rights.