Lawyers and Justice: An Ethical Study

by David Luban

Book Overview

The law, Holmes said, is no brooding omnipresence in the sky. "If that is true," writes David Luban, "it is because we encounter the legal system in the form of flesh-and-blood human beings: the police if we are unlucky, but for the (marginally) luckier majority, the lawyers." For practical purposes, the lawyers are the law. In this comprehensive study of legal ethics, Luban examines the conflict between common morality and the lawyer's "role morality"...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691022909
• ISBN13: 9780691022901
• Release Date: December 1988
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 472 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.1" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

One of the best books on legal ethics written...

I fear an earlier reviewer either misunderstood (or just failed to understand) Luban's book, because the logic is far from circular, and the text is one of the best and most thorough treatments of the limits of role morality within the adversarial system. Yes, it's a difficult book, but this is a difficult subject, and the level of nuance and subtlety in Luban's argument demands careful reading. I've taught legal ethics for 15 years, and I have yet to find a book that treats both the legal and philosophical issues as well as Luban's does. I highly recommend this book, either for the philosophically minded lawyer or the legally inclined philosopher.

very perceptive

Very interesting read...I have to say I disagree with the previous reviewer. Recommended for anyone with an interest in philosophy of law.