Natural Law
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Natural law
is the doctrine that just laws are immanent in nature (that can be
claimed as discovered
but not created by such things as a bill of rights) and/or that they
can emerge by natural process of resolving conflicts (as embodied by
common law). These two aspects are actually very different, and can
sometimes oppose or complement each other, although they share
the common trait that they rely on immanence as opposed to design in
finding just laws. In either case, law seeks more to
discover a truth that is considered to exist independent and outside of the legal process itself, rather than simply to
declare or apply a principle whose origin is inside the legal system.
The concept of
natural law was very important in the development of Anglo-American
common law. In the struggles between Parliament and the monarchy,
Parliament often made reference to the Fundamental Laws of England
which embodied
natural law since time immemorial and set limits on the power of the
monarchy. The concept of natural law was expressed in the
English Bill of Rights and the U.S. Declaration of Independence-- and by 19th-century anarchist and legal theorist, Lysander Spooner.
"The Creation speaketh a universal language, independently
of human speech or human language, multiplied and various as they
may be. It is an ever-existing original, which every man can read.
It cannot be forged; it cannot be counterfeited; it cannot be lost;
it cannot be altered; it cannot be suppressed. It does not depend
upon the will of man whether it shall be published or not; it
publishes itself from one end of the earth to the other. It preaches
to all nations and to all worlds; and this word of God reveals to man
all that is necessary for man to know of God." -- Thomas
Paine
Socrates (469-399 BCE):
"Know thyself."
"Wisdom begins in wonder."
"There is only one evil - ignorance."
