Two Variations on a Holmesian Theme: The Concept of Law According to Max Radin and Thurman W. Arnold

Abstract

This work is part of a line of research on reflections on “the concept of law” developed within American legal realism. Specifically, it analyzes the positions on this topic of two prominent American realists: Max Radin and Thurman W. Arnold. Radin reviews the theses on the “definition of law” developed by founding fathers of the realist school, such as Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. and John Chipman Gray, placing particular emphasis on the justification of judicial decisions as a central element of “what the courts actually do”. For his part, Arnold focuses his analysis, rather than on “predicting what the courts will actually do,” on an aspect of the “Law” that other authors of the realist school had demystified rather than investigated. This is, in Arnold's own words, its (important) facet as a “great repository of emotionally relevant social symbols.”