Validity and obligation of law according to the relationship between Law and Morality from Aquinas and Hart's point of view

Rezaei, Mohammad

doi:10.22054/wph.2024.75470.2179

Validity and obligation of law according to the relationship between Law and Morality from Aquinas and Hart's point of view

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

mohammad rezaei

Assistant Professor of Ardabil Islamic Azad University

https://doi.org/10.22054/wph.2024.75470.2179

Abstract

This article was written with the aim of investigating the validity and obligation of law according to the relationship between Law and morality in Aquinas and Hart's thought. In this article, information was collected by library method and analyzed by content analysis method. The results indicated that in Aquinas's thought, moral validity is a necessary condition for legal validity. Therefore, any law that is unjust will not be valid and the moral duty of citizens is not to obey such a law. but Hart does not consider such a condition necessary for the legality of law. According to Hart, law and morality can be related in two ways: one is Transverse, which includes the acceptance of moral principles in the rule of recognition and compliance with the minimum content of the laws from an moral point of view. The other is the Inherent relationship, which was the observance of the formal justice of the law, which meant similar treatment with similar cases. Such an attitude is not incompatible with the principles of positivism because it is only a formal aspect. Based on this both Aquinas and Hart acknowledged the role of morality in law, however, there was a difference in the way they analyzed and viewed this issue, so that unlike Aquinas in Hart's view, the lack of moral validity does not lead to the invalidity of the law although it can be he called a law a bad law

Keywords

Philosophy of law

Law

Morality

Validity of law

legal obligation

Subjects

philosophy

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