THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF MR. JUSTICE HOLMES
THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF MR. JUSTICE HOLMES
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先生的政治哲学
DOI：
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发表时间：
1931
期刊：
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通讯作者：
H. Laski
中科院分区：
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作者：
H. Laski
一般来说，法官必须以组织间的方式处理政治问题，因为他们不选择他们要宣判的主题。因此，对于法官来说，展示一种政治哲学的情况很少见，这种哲学暗示的不仅仅是一系列半意识的假设，聪明的学生可能希望从这些假设中提取出一般性的推论。此外，无论是天生的还是训练有素的，法官都很少是一位系统的哲学家。他的一生是在对特殊的细微关注中度过的；他对社会的实际价值至少取决于他对普遍的刻意避免，以及他对实现普遍的追求。我们可以冒昧地提出这样一种观点，即首席大法官马歇尔或埃尔登勋爵、爱德华·科克爵士或曼斯菲尔德将如何处理整个事情的政治方案；因为他们所处的时代的情况使他们不得不在不同的努力领域进行不同的阐述。但是，在很大程度上，法官的政治哲学是一系列含糊其辞的暗示，像姆朗茨奎、边沁或萨维尼这样的人必须将这些暗示塑造成一个系统。对于这一一般规则，霍姆斯大法官也不例外。我们在相当严格的轮廓中知道他处理政治问题的方式，但命运使哲学背景和具体原则之间的联系不可避免地在性质上支离破碎。我们可能想知道的事情，他的观点，例如，关于民主政府的优点和缺点的观点，他关于国家的终极性质的理论，他对集体主义行动的适当限制(如果有的话)的态度，这些都不是可以从法官那里进行详尽分析的问题。他不得不在以下框架内工作
JUDGES, as a rule, must approach political problems interstitially, for they do not choose the subjects upon which they are to pronounce. It is rare, therefore, for a judge to exhibit a philosophy of politics which implies more than a series of half-conscious assumptions from which the ingenious student may hope to extract inferences of a general kind. The judge, moreover, is rarely, either by nature or training, a systematic philosopher. His life has been passed in minute attention to the particular; his practical value to the community depends at least as much upon his deliberate avoidance of the universal as upon his search for its attainment. We can hazard a view about the way in which Chief Justice Marshall or Lord Eldon, Sir Edward Coke or Mansfield would have approached the political scheme of things entire; for the circumstances of their period bound them to diverse exposition in varied fields of effort. But, for the most part, the political philosophy of judges is a series of halfarticulate hints which men like Mlontesquieu or Bentham or Savigny must mold into a system. To this general rule, Mr. Justice Holmes is no exception. We know, in fairly rigorous outline, the manner of his approach to political problems; but fate has made the connectionbetween philosophic background and detailed principle inevitably fragmentary in character. The things we might wish to know, his views, for instance, upon the merits and weaknesses of democratic government, his theory of the ultimate nature of the state, his attitude as to the proper limits, if any, of collectivist action, these are not issues susceptible of exhaustive analysis from the Bench. He has had to work within the framework of