社会变迁中的法律修辞变化

法律与修辞之间有着密切的联系。通过对法律修辞的历史加以考察,可以发现,传统社会中的法律修辞侧重于文学性的积极修辞,现代社会中的法律修辞则以理性化的消极修辞为主,与推理论证结合得更加紧密。这种修辞风格的变化,反映的是社会变迁中社会分工的专业化。而社会分工的专业化与决策过程的民主化并存于现代社会之中,使得不同修辞风格之间存在着竞争。这种竞争的更深层背景是权力的竞争。     

解决“疑难”案件的法律修辞方法——以交通肇事连环案为研究对象的诠释

疑难案件超出了法律规范的涵摄范围,对它的处理不仅需要法律发现、法律推理和法律解释,还需要一种"把法律作为修辞"的思维方式。法律修辞是在其他法律方法的基础上,依照法律体系的规范性和案件的具体语境对当事人等进行的劝导和论辩。它突破了传统方法的单一性,通过修辞上的"谋篇布局"着眼于对各方当事人的说服。所以,法律修辞是运用法治意识形态所构建的法治思维和法治方式。在中国语境下,法律修辞对疑难案件的解决具有重要意义。     

论法律规范选择推理

司法实践中需要根据法律规范对需判决案件作出处理结论,这是一个推理过程。在这一推理过程中,法律规范选择推理相对于形式推理在一些复杂案件中起到了重要的弥补作用。本文指出对法律规范选择推理的研究可以加强司法工作者在法律实践中的推理、论证能力,指导司法实践。     

论法律制度的修辞之维

作为一套严谨的体系,人类的法律制度既搭架在逻辑的前提下,同时也建立在修辞的基础上,所以,法律制度不仅具有逻辑之维,也具有修辞之维。在人文社会科学领域,逻辑推论的基本前提其实是修辞,法律制度作为人类思维的产物,其逻辑体系结构在修辞前提下。被人们广泛认同的法治概念,本身就是一个典型的价值假设和修辞主张,而无罪推定更是法律制度体系内部修辞表达的典型例证。     

法律逻辑：回顾与展望

法律逻辑的历史大致分为三个阶段：第一阶段主要是建立以传统逻辑或一阶逻辑内容为框架的法律逻辑体系,并将这些理论广泛地运用于法律思维领域之中;第二阶段主要是从法律适用问题的研究扩展到了法律发现或获取问题的研究;第三阶段主要是对事实发现、法律获取、诉讼主张与裁决证成的规律、规则与方法进行系统的研究,逐渐地建立以事实推理、法律推理、判决推理与法律论证理论为主要内容的不同于传统逻辑与一阶逻辑框架的法律逻辑体系,并将这些理论应用于事实的发现、法律的获取、诉讼主张与裁决的证立之中。     

论立法修辞的要素

现代法治国家立法质量的提升需要借助于修辞。立法修辞就是立法者在制定法律的过程中为获得人们对法律内容的认同而采取说服性手段的行为。立法修辞过程至少包含了三个关键要素,即权威、听众和修辞方法。立法者权威是立法修辞的起点,在此基础上,立法者还需要通过特定的技术提升立法本身的权威。作为修辞所要影响的人,听众不再作为单纯的受众,而成为了修辞活动的中心,立法者必须结合特定的语境来以选择适当的修辞策略和方法,以实现立法的可接受性。     

法律修辞在中国兴起的背景及其在司法审判中的作用

中国的社会转型使我们处于一个高度不确定的风险环境中,这为以不确定性因素为逻辑起点的法律修辞研究提供了丰富的现实土壤。但法律修辞学在中国学界被热捧的理论基础,并不像它在西方社会复兴时那样坚实。当前中国社会并没有经历法律形式主义极度发达的严格法治时代,没有形成严格守法的习惯,缺乏遏事遵守规则的意识。因此,立足于省略三段论推理、强调理性说服功能的法律修辞研究,必须在崇尚程序规制的法律论证框架下使用,才能坚持司法审判的首要目标是依法正确判决,然后才是通过修辞的合理包装送达当事人和社会。     

实质法律推理于司法过程中的定位

实质法律推理的运用使司法具有了合理性、协调性和实效性。无论从法官的基本信念、思维方式、审理技巧,还是从法官的期待来看,实质法律推理在司法过程中都应得到普遍的运用。但是在我国,由于多方面的原因,法官优先选择形式法律推理,对实质法律推理报以谨慎的态度。必须要以实质法律推理为核心来重塑司法推理体系。     

实质法律推理的方法反思与建构——以典型案例分析为视角

法律推理是重要的法律方法,特别是实质法律推理对疑难案件的处理更具有不可替代的作用.基于对我国近年来典型案例法律推理的实证分析发现,司法实践中的实质法律推理普遍存在正常适用缺失、标准选择不当、逻辑混乱和适用条件不准确等问题,而导致实质法律推理运用存在问题的原因主要是推理过程中存在思维阻隔、技术障碍、社会舆论不当干预.因此,仔细斟酌实质法律推理的运用条件、严格筛选实质法律推理的标准、克服实质法律推理适用的心理障碍,以及充分把握实质法律推理的运用技术是提高实质法律推理运用效果的基本对策.     

法律推理中的独特思维倾向及其可能的误区

法律推理是一种特殊的推理。它既具有推理的一般特征,也有自身的独特性。法律推理的独特性主要表现在推理主体的思维方式上。在法律推理中,人们根深蒂固地具有三种思维倾向:规则取向、概念取向与自治取向。这些思维倾向是在长期的法律推理活动中形成的,因此在法官、律师、学者等专业或经常从事法律推理的主体身上最为凸显。正因如此,它们有时也被称为法律人的思维方式或法律(人)思维。一般情况下,这些思维倾向使得相关主体更有可能得出正确的裁判结论,有助于说明判决的合法性来源,并在一定程度上增进了限权、平等、法治等对于现代社会来说极为重要的政治道德理想。但如果在一些相关理论问题上缺乏正确认识,它们也可能会给法律事业造成危害。为了推动法律领域内的知识增长与实践进步,我们要对这些思维倾向有充分、自觉的认识,一方面要承认它们的存在并给予应有的尊重;另一方面也要注意防范可能的风险。     

Unpopular Sovereignty?

Popular sovereignty was presented in modern constitutional discourse as a mode of collective action. It was supposedly manifest in the power to constitute, control and dismantle governments. Important strands of contemporary constitutional theory, notably legal constitutionalism and deliberative democracy, have taken leave of this tradition. They have severed the connection between sovereignty and action. What remains of popular sovereignty is fundamental rights and values, or dispersed networks of deliberation. This is based on the the idea that the place of power is ‘empty’ and legitimised on the principle of including ‘All-Affected-Interests’. The very concept of sovereignty thus becomes unpopular. This contribution aims to re-establish the link between popular sovereignty and action by examining sovereignty's emancipatory telos, its majoritarian mode of operation and its dependence on political citizenship.     

The ghost that slayed the mandate

Virginia v. Sebelius is a federal lawsuit in which Virginia has challenged President Obama's signature legislative initiative of health care reform. Virginia has sought declaratory and injunctive relief to vindicate a state statute declaring that no Virginia resident shall be required to buy health insurance. To defend this state law from the preemptive effect of federal law, Virginia has contended that the federal legislation's individual mandate to buy health insurance is unconstitutional. Virginia's lawsuit has been one of the most closely followed and politically salient federal cases in recent times. Yet the very features of the case that have contributed to its political salience also require its dismissal for lack of statutory subject matter jurisdiction. The Supreme Court has placed limits on statutory subject matter jurisdiction over declaratory judgment actions in which a state seeks a declaration that a state statute is not preempted by federal law--precisely the relief sought in Virginia v. Sebelius. These statutory limits are a sea wall; they keep out, on statutory grounds, some suits that should otherwise be kept out on Article III grounds. The statutory and constitutional limits on federal jurisdiction over suits like Virginia v. Sebelius insulate federal courts from the strong political forces surrounding lawsuits that follow from state statutes designed to create federal jurisdiction over constitutional challenges by states to federal law. This Article identifies previously neglected jurisdictional limits, shows why they demand dismissal of Virginia v. Sebelius, and explains why it is appropriate for federal courts to be closed to suits of this type.     

Less Democracy, More Courts: A Puzzle of Judicial Review in Russia

This article explores why, throughout the 1990s, some Russian regions created their own constitutional courts and others did not. Contrary to current theories that assert that politicians create a strong and independent judiciary to protect them from the tyranny of election-winners in the context of political uncertainty, my analysis finds that constitutional courts emerged only in those regions where governors virtually guaranteed their re-election by consolidating their political power vis-à-vis federal and local governments. The article argues that both federal and regional politicians used the process of creating subnational constitutional courts to legitimize their federalism and judicial reforms. The changes in the balance of power between those governors, who aspired to have their own judicial system, and the federal government that insisted on a single federal judicial system, determined the variation in the process of court-building across Russian regions.     

论单一制中国的财政联邦制——以中央与地方财政关系为视角

单一制与联邦制只不过是国家纵向权力配置模式的类型化。任何国家都存在集权或分权两种力的作用,中国便是一个带有联邦制因素的单一制国家。中国财政联邦制的发展与单一制国家结构框架内的体制多有抵牾,但中国财政联邦制的变革并不意味着宪政联邦制的确立。     

Constitutional Review in the United States and Austria: Notes on the Beginnings

Abstract.   Despite far-reaching historical and political differences, and despite legal systems that reflect altogether different traditions, the United States and Austria manifest striking similarities where some aspects of their respective development of constitutional review are concerned. For example, on the constitutional review of federalist issues (competing claims of federal and state law), the review power was there from the beginning in both countries. And both countries developed a power of constitutional review reaching to the enactments of the federal legislature. In a brief sketch of aspects of the early development of constitutional review in both countries, the author looks, in particular, to the kinds of arguments made on behalf of constitutional review in the American and Austrian legal systems.     

Multiple Sovereignty: On Europe's Self-Constitutionalization and Legal Self-Reference

This article focuses on theoretical reflections on sovereignty and constitutionalism in the context of the globalization and Europeanisation of the nation states, their politics, and legal systems. Starting from a critical assessment of the Kelsen-Schmitt polemic, the author claims that sovereignty needs to be analysed by the sociological method in order to disclose its current structural differentiation. The constitution of society may be imagined as the multitude of self-constituted and functionally differentiated social subsystems. The constitutional pluralism argument subsequently reconceptualizes sovereignty as socially differentiated and divided between specific subsystems. The EU's differentiated constitutional domain and the paradox of divided sovereignty are used as examples of profound structural and semantic changes in contemporary national and transnational societies. While the sovereign nation-state institutions have become marginalized in political structures of European societies, the self-constitutionalization of the functionally differentiated EU legal system proceeds by internalizing the concept of divided sovereignty and using it semantically as its mode of self-reference.     

Post‐Sovereignty and the European Legal Space

The political constitution of the European polity has become strained in recent years by insistent pressures on its institutional capacity to resolve social problems. The article examines the EU's polity crisis in the context of the development of a distinctive modern conception of secular constitutional authority, focused on the ideal of sovereign self‐determination. As the work of Neil MacCormick illustrates, the EU provides a radical challenge to the on‐going capacity of the concept of sovereignty to provide a framework to address problems of legitimacy. The article explores the nature of this challenge, its historical context and its consequences with reference to debates over the nature of constitutional pluralism. It sets out a path to the renewal of the European constitutional debate through a re‐consideration of secular constitutional authority and the necessity of its connection to the idea of sovereignty. The article seeks to re‐engage in the task of ‘questioning sovereignty’.     

Justice Excused: The Deployment of Law in Everyday Political Encounters

This paper examines the use of legal claims by government officials and citizens in everyday political encounters involving civil rights. Data come from 580 letters sent to the federal government between 1939 and 1941, and from the replies sent by the newly formed Civil Rights Section of the Justice Department. In almost every case, the department refused to intervene and explained its refusal by making legal claims about federal jurisdiction. These legal claims masked the department's discretionary choices and thus helped depoliticize the encounters. Surprisingly, however, a substantial number of letter writers challenged the government's legal claims by deploying their own legal and moral arguments. The willingness of these citizens to challenge official legal pronouncements cautions against making broad generalizations about the capacity of ordinary people to respond effectively when government officials deploy legal rhetoric.     

主权在民:源流与反思

主权在民原则系宪法之首要原则。主权在民原则经历了由国家主权、政治主权、议会主权到人民主权的发展过程。主权在民原则既是近代宪法的逻辑起点,又指导着宪法具体制度的建立。主权在民原则在历史上发挥了巨大的作用,但也应当厘清、识别和深刻反思主权在民在宪政成长过程中的作用与局限。     

Administrative "health courts" for medical injury claims: the federal constitutional issues

Our article analyzes whether the federal government may constitutionally supplant a traditional system of common-law trials before state judges and juries with new federal institutions designed by statute for compensating victims of medical injuries. Specifically, this article examines the federal constitutional issues raised by various proposals to replace traditional medical malpractice litigation in state courts with a federal system of administrative "health courts." In doing so, we address the following constitutional issues: 1. Is there federal authority to preempt state law (the commerce clause and spending clause issues)? 2. May jurisdiction be created in non-article 3 tribunals, and may claims be decided without trial by jury (the separation of powers and Seventh Amendment issues)? 3. Would pilot programs that require some claims to be pursued in a federal administrative forum while other claimants are left to pursue traditional state tort law remedies be constitutional (the equal protection issue)? The article concludes that a federal compensation system through administrative health courts should be constitutional provided the statute is appropriately drafted and that appropriate factual findings are made concerning the benefits to patients and the public as well as to doctors and their insurers.