Tax Jurisprudence with Benevolence and Love

Abstract

A unique feature of tax jurisprudence is its origins in natural law. Tax jurisprudence is premised upon a description of human nature as individualistic and competitive as given by Thomas Hobbes. But, such a selfish description of human nature does not reflect the rich philosophy of natural law of the Scottish Enlightenment. This paper sets out to incorporate the natural law principles of “benevolence” and “love” and considerations of the “common good” as developed by Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, and the subsequent existential reinterpretation by Soren Kierkegaard, into a more comprehensive version of tax jurisprudence.