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Reason and Democracy breaks new ground in providing a plausible philosophical basis for the communitarian view of a healthy democracy as the rational pursuit of common purposes by free and equal citizens. Thomas A. Spragens Jr. argues that the most persistent paradigms of Western political rationality originated in classical philosophy, took their modern expression in the philosophies of Kant and Mill, and terminated in Max Weber's pairing of purely technical rationality with arbitrary ends.Drawing on recent work in the philosophy of science and the philosophy of language, combined with approp

Reason and Democracy breaks new ground in providing a plausible philosophical basis for the communitarian view of a healthy democracy as the rational pursuit of common purposes by free and equal citizens. Thomas A. Spragens Jr. argues that the most persistent paradigms of Western political rationality originated in classical philosophy, took their modern expression in the philosophies of Kant and Mill, and terminated in Max Weber's pairing of purely technical rationality with arbitrary ends. Drawing on recent work in the philosophy of science and the philosophy of language, combined with approp.

"Cover" -- "Title Page" -- "Copyright Page" -- "Table of Contents" -- "Foreword" -- "Preface" -- "About the Authors" -- "1 What Legal Reasoning Is, and Why It Matters" -- "An Overview of Law and Politics" -- "The Law Is All Around Us" -- "The Rule of Law Keeps the Peace" -- "The Critical Importance of Judicial Impartiality" -- "A Definition of Law" -- "A Definition of Legal Reasoning" -- "Legal Reasoning Does Not Discover the "One Right Answer"" -- "The Four Elements of Legal Reasoning" -- "Case Facts" -- "Social Background Facts" -- "Rules of Law" -- "Widely Shared Values" -- "Sources of Official Legal Texts" -- "The Choices that Legal Reasoning Confronts" -- "Illustrative Case" -- "Questions about the Case" -- "2 Change and Stability in Legal Reasoning" -- "Sources of Unpredictability in Law" -- "The Disorderly Conduct of Words" -- "The Unpredictability of Precedents" -- "Is Unpredictability in Law Desirable?" -- "Vertical and Horizontal Stare Decisis: A Stabilizing and Clarifying Element in Law" -- "Illustrative Cases" -- "Questions about the Cases" -- "3 Common Law" -- "Origins of Common Law" -- "Reasoning by Example in Common Law" -- "The Cherry Tree" -- "The Pit" -- "The Diving Board" -- "Keeping the Common-Law Tradition Alive" -- "Making Common Law without Close Precedents" -- "Horizontal Stare Decisis in Common Law" -- "The Common-Law Tradition Today" -- "Illustrative Case" -- "Questions about the Case" -- "4 Statutory Interpretation" -- "What Are Statutes?" -- "Four Misguided Approaches to "First Instance" Statutory Interpretation" -- "Literalism: Sticking to the Words" -- "The Golden Rule" -- "Canons of Statutory Construction" -- "Legislative Intent" -- "Purpose: The Key to Wise Statutory Interpretation" -- "The Centrality of Statutory Purpose" -- "Determining Purpose: Words Can Help" -- "Determining Purpose: The Audience