Natural Law
...ve little thought to the fact that while each pursues his own end- often at cross purposes with each other- they unconsciously proceed to an unknown natural end, as if following a guiding thread; and they work to promote an end they would put little store by, even if they were aware of it. ( Kant, Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Intent, 1983 :29) "A human legislator does not have a perfect will, as God has; and therefore ... such a legislator may sometimes prescribe unjust things, a fact which is manifestly true; but he has not the power to bind through unjust laws, and consequently, even though he may indeed prescribe that which is unjust, such a precept is not law, inasmuch as it lacks the force or validity to impose a binding obligation." (Francisco Suarez, On Laws, and on God as Legislator (17th c.) The term 'natural law' is ambiguous. It refers to a type of moral theory, as well as to a type of legal theory, despite the fact that the core claims of the two kinds of theory are logically independent. According to natural law ethical theory, the moral standards that govern human behaviour are, in some sense, objectively derived from the nature of human beings. According to natural law legal theory, the authority of at least some legal standards necessarily derives, at least in part, from considerations having to do with the moral merit of those standards. There are a number of different kinds of natural law theories of law, differing from each other with respect to the role that morality plays in determining the authority of legal norms. "As Augustine says, that which is not right seems to be no law at all; wherefore the force of a law depends on the extent to which it is right. ... Consequently, every human law has the nature of law only to the extent that it is derived from the law of nature. But if, in any point, it deviates from the law of nature, it is no longer a law but a perversion of law. ... when an authority imposes on his subjects burdensome 'laws' conducive not to the common good but rather to his own cupidity and vainglory .... the like are acts of violence rather than laws .... wherefore such 'laws' do not bind in conscience .... A tyrannical government is not right ... Consequently, there is no sedition in disturbing a government of this kind .... Indeed, it is the tyrant, rather, that is guilty of sedition .... If a thing is of itself contrary to natural right, the human will cannot make it right ...." — Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologić (13th c.) As William Blackstone describes, "This law of nature, being co-evil with mankind and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all their force, and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original" (1979, 41). Some object to the law of nature, claiming that no such law exists at all, since it is discovered nowhere; for the greatest part of mankind lives as if there were no guiding principle to life at all so if there were, in fact, a law of nature, knowable by the light of reason, how does it happen that all men who are endowed with reason know it not? So does Natural law exist in the modern legal system ? According to John Locke “ A blind man cannot read a notice displayed publicly, it does not follow that a law does not exist or is not promulgated, nor because it is difficult for someone who has poor sight to read it; nor because someone who is occupied with other matters does not have the time, nor because it is not to the liking of the idle or vicious to lift his eyes to the public notice and learn from it the statement of his duty. I allow that reason is granted to all by nature, and I affirm that there exists a law of nature, knowable by reason. But it does not follow necessarily from this that it is known to each and all, for some make no use of this light, but love the darkness .... But the sun itself reveals the way to none but to him who opens his eyes .... Some men who are nurtured in vices scarcely distinguish between good and evil, since evil occupations, growing strong with the passage of time, have led them into strange disposi...