Justice and Law

Abstract

This article proposes that the commonsense conception of legal justice is simply treating people as the law provides. Law, however, can be flawed from the standpoint of extralegal justice. In that case, the term ‘legal justice’ sounds like a misnomer – a wrongful appropriation of the terminology of justice viewed as a moral virtue. The article examines two avenues of response to this problem: first, theories that narrow the gap between legal and extralegal justice, and second, theories according to which the central virtue of legal systems is something other than justice. Among the former, the article discusses natural law theories, moralized theories of interpretation, equity, and certain forms of alternative dispute resolution. Among the latter, it discusses economic, pragmatic, and feminist alternatives to a justice-centered account of law's virtues.