Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T06:01:52.204Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A Juridical Right to Lie

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2019

Hamish Stewart
Hamish Stewart*
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
*
Email: hamish.stewart@utoronto.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Kant’s essay ‘On a Supposed Right to Lie from Philanthropy’ claims that everyone has an unconditional duty of right not to lie under any circumstances. This claim creates a conflict within the doctrine of right because Kant also claims that each of us is under an unconditional duty of right to obey the positive law in force in the civil condition in all circumstances. In Kant’s specific example, truthfulness would violate the positive law because it would make the speaker an accomplice to a crime. Since both duties flow from the requirement that we not act inconsistently with the possibility of rightful relations among humans, a juridical solution to the conflict must be possible. That solution is to recognize that lying in appropriate circumstances is akin to the use of force in self-defence or defence of a third party.

Keywords

lyingKant’s legal philosophyKant’s political philosophyself-defence
Type
Articles
Information
Kantian Review , Volume 24 , Issue 3 , September 2019 , pp. 465 - 481
Copyright
© Kantian Review, 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Byrd, Sharon and Hruschka, Joachim (2010) Kant’s Doctrine of Right: A Commentary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Constant, Benjamin (1988) De la force du gouvernement actuel de la France et de la nécessité de s’y rallier; Des Réactions politiques; Des Effets de la terreur. Paris: Flammarion.Google Scholar
Dietrichson, Paul (1964) ‘When is a Maxim Fully Universalizable?’. Kant-Studien 00, 143–70.Google Scholar
Dubber, Markus D. (2002) Criminal Law: Model Penal Code. New York: Foundation Press.Google Scholar
Herman, Barbara (2011) ‘A Mismatch of Methods’. In Parfit, Derek, On What Matters (Oxford: Oxford University Press), vol. 2, pp. 83–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel (1996) Practical Philosophy. Trans. and ed. Mary Gregor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Kant, Immanuel (1997) Lectures on Ethics. Trans. Peter Heath, ed. Peter Heath and J. B. Schneewind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Korsgaard, Christine (1996) Creating the Kingdom of Ends. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Korsgaard, Christine (1997) ‘Taking the Law into our own Hands: Kant on the Right to Revolution’. In Reath, Andrews, Herman, Barbara and Korsgaard, Christine (eds), Reclaiming the History of Ethics: Essays for John Rawls (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 297–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mahon, James Edwin (2009) ‘The Truth about Kant on Lies’. In Martin, Clancy (ed.), The Philosophy of Deception (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 201–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mertens, Thomas (2016) ‘On Kant’s Duty to Speak the Truth’. Kantian Review, 21, 27–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ormerod, David (2011) Smith and Hogan’s Criminal Law. 13th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paton, H. J. (1954) ‘An Alleged Right to Lie: A Problem in Kantian Ethics’. Kant-Studien, 45, 190–203.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ripstein, Arthur (2009) Force and Freedom. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schapiro, Tamar (2006) ‘Kantian Rigorism and Mitigating Circumstances’. Ethics, 117, 32–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sedgwick, Sally (1991) ‘On Lying and the Role of Content in Kant’s Ethics’. Kant-Studien, 82, 42–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shiffrin, Barbara V. (2015) Speech Matters. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Stefani, Gaston, et al. (2003) Droit pénal générale. 18th ed. Paris: Dalloz.Google Scholar
Sussman, David (2009) ‘On the Supposed Duty of Truthfulness: Kant on Lying in Self-Defense’. In Martin, Clancy (ed.), The Philosophy of Deception (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 225–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thorburn, Malcolm (2008) ‘Justifications, Powers, and Authority’. Yale Law Journal, 117, 1070–1130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Varden, Helga (2010) ‘Kant and Lying to the Murderer at the Door … One More Time: Kant’s Legal Philosophy and Lies to Murderers and Nazis’. Journal of Social Philosophy, 41, 403–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinrib, Jacob (2008) ‘The Juridical Significance of Kant’s “Supposed Right to Lie”’. Kantian Review, 13, 141–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinrib, Jacob (2016) Dimensions of Dignity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Allen W. (2008) Kantian Ethics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wood, Allen W. (2014) The Free Development of Each. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar