H.L.A. Hart’s “Minimum Content of Natural Law”

Year 2020, Volume: 7 Issue: 2, 119 - 130, 21.01.2021

Özde Dereboylular

Abstract

The classic work of “The Concept of Law” written by H.L.A Hart is widely recognized as providing the zenith of legal positivism. Hart’s proposition is that the basic failure of the Austinian model is its neglect of the concept of a rule. Hart claims that for understanding the foundations of a legal system, rather than an account based on habitual obedience to the commands of an unlimited sovereign, a necessary insight will be that laws are a species of rules and ultimately the foundations of a legal system will be based on the acceptance of a fundamental rule. According to Hart, without the idea of a rule it is not possible to elucidate even the most elementary forms of law and he goes on to identify that the key to the science of jurisprudence lies in the union of what he terms “primary” and “secondary” rules. He therefore definitely disagrees with the proposition that a legal system is just a reflection of political power. This article is about H.L.A. Hart’s study “minimum content of natural law”. The article firstly explains briefly Hart’s theory. His five truisms which is necessary to qualify as law is explained by making reference to examples from black letter law and a critique including the text’s strengths and weaknesses is being provided.

Keywords

H.L.A. Hart, Positivism, Natural Law

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