Against Obligation: The Multiple Sources of Authority
in a Liberal Democracy
by Abner S. Greene (Author)
Do citizens of a nation such as the United States have
a moral duty to obey the law? Do officials, when interpreting the Constitution,
have an obligation to follow what that text meant when ratified? To follow
precedent? To follow what the Supreme Court today says the Constitution means?
These are questions of political obligation (for
citizens) and interpretive obligation (for anyone interpreting the
Constitution, often officials). Abner Greene argues that such obligations do
not exist. Although citizens should obey some laws entirely, and other laws in
some instances, no one has put forth a successful argument that citizens should
obey all laws all the time. Greene’s case is not only “against” obligation. It
is also “for” an approach he calls “permeable sovereignty”: all of our norms
are on equal footing with the state’s laws. Accordingly, the state should
accommodate religious, philosophical, family, or tribal norms whenever
possible.
Greene shows that questions of interpretive obligation
share many qualities with those of political obligation. In rejecting the view
that constitutional interpreters must follow either prior or higher sources of
constitutional meaning, Greene confronts and turns aside arguments similar to
those offered for a moral duty of citizens to obey the law.
