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Freedom and Education: Pierce v. Society of Sisters Reconsidered
Donald P. Kommers and Michael J. Wahoske
Symposium to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the landmark case, Pierce v. Society of Sisters. Pierce v. Society of Sisters has long been celebrated as the Supreme Court case which vindicated the existence & free exercise of the right to private education.
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Abortion: New Directions for Policy Studies
Donald P. Kommers
Book Chapter
Donald P. Kommers, Abortion and the Constitution: The Cases of West Germany and the United States, in Abortion: New Directions for Policy Studies 83 (Edward Manier, William Liu, & David Solomon eds., 1977)
On January 22, 1973, the United States Supreme Court substantially curtailed the power of the American states to prohibit or limit the right of a woman to procure an abortion. On February 25, 1975, the West German Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the German parliament, by permitting abortions within the first three months of pregnancy, violated the constitutional rights of unborn children. These decisions provide us with an uncommon opportunity to compare the constitutional law of different nations on abortion. That the highest tribunals of two robust constitutional democracies and secular political cultures should decide the question of the unborn child's right to life under the constitutions of their respective countries differently should excite the wonder of us all, no matter where we may stand in the abortion controversy.
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Judicial Politics in West Germany: A Study of the Federal Constitutional Court
Donald P. Kommers
The Federal Constitutional Court is an important policy-making institution in the German political system. As the guardian of the Basic Law, the Constitutional Court has played a critical role in umpiring the federal system, resolving conflicts among branches of the national government, overseeing the process of parliamentary democracy, monitoring the financing of political parties, and reviewing restrictions on basic rights and liberties. In each of these areas, the Court's decisions have shaped the contours of German life and politics. Its influence is fully the equal of that of the Supreme Court in American politics. Despite its “activist” record of nullifying laws favored by legislative majorities, the German Court has managed to retain its institutional independence as well as the trust of the general public.
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Legal Interviewing and Counseling in a Nutshell
Thomas L. Shaffer
Solving Problems and Telling Stories; Lawyer Persona and Feelings it Disguises; Establishing a Working Relationship; Getting the Facts (Interviewing); Theories and Models for Helping Relationships; Interventions and Skills; Place, Space and Territory; Sharing Authority and Collaborative Decision Making; Moral Dimension; Understanding Ourselves.
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The Rights and Wrongs of Abortion
John M. Finnis, Marshall Cohen, Thomas Nagel, and Thomas Scanlon
During its first two years of publication, Philosophy & Public Affairs contributed to the public debate on abortion a set of remarkable and brilliant articles which examine the basic philosophical issues posed by this controversial subject: whether the fetus is a person, whether it has a right to life, whether a woman has a right to decide what happens in and to her body, whether there is an ethical connection between abortion and infanticide, whether there is any point after conception where it is possible to draw the line beyond which killing is impermissible. These five essays, together here for the first time in a single volume, offer radically differing points of view; they provide the best sustained discussion of these philosophical issues available anywhere.
Contents: Judith Jarvis Thomson, "A Defense of Abortion"; Roger Wertheimer, "Understanding the Abortion Argument"; Michael Tooley, "Abortion and Infanticide"; John Finnis, "The Rights and Wrongs of Abortion"; and Judith Jarvis Thomson, "Rights and Deaths."
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Menschenwürde und Freiheitliche Rechtsordnung
Donald P. Kommers
Book Chapter
Donald P. Kommers, Freedom and Authority, in Menschenwürde und Freiheitliche Rechtsordnung 357 (Gerhard Leibholz et al. eds., 1974).
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Jurisprudence: Cases and Materials
Thomas F. Broden and Robert E. Rodes
The Second Edition of Jurisprudence Cases and Materials includes several new features. First, it begins with two chapters on the ancient Near Eastern, biblical, and classical origins of law and jurisprudence. Second, it offers chapters that trace the systematic development of the Anglo-American analytic canon and modern critical responses. Continental thought is incorporated along with the realist and pragmatic traditions that remain among the major American contributions to jurisprudential thought. Third, the Second Edition retains and further develops analysis of jurisprudence in the courts. The result, we think, is a book that attains unusual breadth and richness of treatment of the web of law and philosophy.
The Second Edition, like the first, uses cases to make jurisprudence more meaningful to students and to explore the "relevance" of jurisprudence, exploring how jurisprudential assumptions implicitly or subconsciously dominate the thinking of jurists and therefore play a role in driving the law. Jurisprudence is at the very heart of law and the book tries to make that clear.
Having in mind the different ways that people like to teach jurisprudence, the authors sought to design a flexible book. Students can be taken sequentially through the ancient Near Eastern, biblical, and Classical origins of law and jurisprudence, the Anglo-American canon, modern critical responses, and how it is all reflected in the courts. The book can be taught sequentially or topically. Materials are provided which can be combined in a rich variety of ways to suit the professor's preference. The authors provide suggestions from their experience of different ways to structure the course from the materials.
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Democracy in Crisis: New Challenges to Constitutional Democracy in the Atlantic Area
Donald P. Kommers
Book Chapter
Donald P. Kommers, Judicial Power and Constitutional Democracy in Italy and West Germany, in Democracy in Crisis: New Challenges to Constitutional Democracy in the Atlantic Area 33 (Edward A. Goerner, ed., 1971)
Democracy in Crisis is a collection of ten short essays on a variety of critical problems confronting democratic governments in Western Europe, the United States, and Canada. In "Judicial Power and Constitutional Democracy in Italy and West Germany," Donald P. Kommers presents a comparative appraisal of judicial review, a controversial yet often neglected aspect of parliamentary democracy in these two former authoritarian states.
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Political Trials
Donald P. Kommers
Book Chapter
Donald P. Kommers, The Spiegel Affair: A Case Study in Judicial Politics, in Political Trials 5 (Theodore L. Becker ed., 1971)
In Political Trials, Theodore L. Becker has brought together 11 original essays illustrating how courts in eight different countries have been used by the powerful to eliminate what they consider to be pesky irritants or deadly challenges.
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Frontiers of Judicial Research
Donald P. Kommers
Book Chapter
Donald P. Kommers, The Federal Constitutional Court in the West German Political System, in Frontiers of Judicial Research 73 (Joel Grossman & Joseph Tanenhaus eds., 1969).
No view of the West German political system is complete without taking into account the role of the Federal Constitutional Court in the total competitive process of authoritative decision making. This role is largely determined by the place assigned the Court in the political system by the Basic Law of the Federal Republic and by the nature of the recruitment process. It is limited by the Court's structure, together with its internal processes of decision making and the political environment in which it functions. My purpose here is to discuss each of these factors and then to link them with selected aspects of the Court's policy-output.
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