The paper starts from the observation that laws are full of conditional norms or obligations, the defeasible character of which prevents representing them by the material implication of classical logic. Material implication almost never adequately represents ordinary “if, then”; in particular, it can account neither for the legal syllogism nor for the practical syllogism ubiquitous in ordinary reasoning. In order to do better, the paper pursues a far-reaching analogy between beliefs (held by a person) and norms (held by an alleged authority). The analogy shows in doxastic and deontic logic. It extends to the Ramsey test, which is usually taken to be the basic explanation of conditionals, i.e., “if, then” sentences, to its treatment in the dynamic setting of belief revision theory and its normative counterpart, and thus to conditional logic and conditional deontic logic. A reflection of Chisholm’s paradox reveals a principled ambiguity in our normative talk; norms may be taken in a purely normative or in a fact-regarding way. In order to account for this ambiguity, the analogy must be further developed within so-called ranking theory which completes the dynamic perspective suggested by the Ramsey test and insufficiently explained in belief revision theory. Only in this account, fact-regarding norms can be explicated. In this way, finally, Chisholm’s paradox can be resolved, and the legal and the practical syllogism can be adequately represented. The paper attempts throughout to keep the connection to legal theorizing and argumentation.