Tag: Public Morality

Topics

Books

Social Cohesion and the Legal Enforcement of Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 35:1 (1990).
IN SEPTEMBER OF 1957, THE COMMITTEE on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution, chaired by Sir John Wolfenden, issued its Report recommending to the British Parliament that “homosexual… More

Conscience and the Public Person

– In Russell E. Smith (ed.), Catholic Conscience: Foundation and Formation (Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research Center, 1991).

Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays

– Oxford University Press, 1992.
Description from Publisher: Natural law theory is enjoying a revival of interest in a variety of scholarly disciplines including law, philosophy, political science, and theology and… More

The Moral Fragility of Constitutionalism

– First Things, January 1993.
Excerpt: In this collection of characteristically brilliant essays, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., one of our nation’s most eminent conservative political theorists, defends the American… More

Religious Liberty and Political Morality

– In Stephen Krason and Donald D'Elia (eds.), We Hold These Truths and More: Reflections on the American Proposition (University of Steubenville Press, 1993).

Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This work brings together leading defenders of Natural Law and Liberalism for a series of frank and lively exchanges touching upon critical issues of… More

The Autonomy of Law: Essays on Legal Positivism

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This collection of original essays from distinguished legal philosophers offers a challenging assessment of the nature and viability of legal positivism, an… More

Law, Democracy, and Moral Disagreement

– Harvard Law Review 110:7 (May 1997).
Reviewed Works: Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done about It by Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson; Legal Reasoning and Political… More

Making Children Moral: Pornography, Parents, and the Public Interest

– Arizona State Law Review 29 (Summer 1997). Reprinted in T. Campbell (ed.), International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory, 2nd Series (Dartmouth Publishing Co. and Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2003).
On two occasions in October of 1965, Sam Ginsberg, proprietor of Sam’s Stationery and Luncheonette in Bellmore, New York, sold magazines containing photographs of nude women to a… More

In Defense of Natural Law

– Oxford University Press, 1999.
Description from Publisher: In Making Men Moral, his 1995 book, George questioned the central doctrines of liberal jurisprudence and political theory. In his new work he extends his… More

Natural Law and Public Reason

– With Christopher Wolfe, eds. Georgetown University Press, 2000.
Description from Publisher: “Public reason” is one of the central concepts in modern liberal political theory. As articulated by John Rawls, it presents a way to overcome the… More

The Concept of Public Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 45:1 (2000). Reprinted in Craig Steven Titus (ed.), The Person and the Polis (Institute for the Psychological Sciences Press, 2006).
Public morality, like public health and safety, is a concern that goes beyond considerations of law and public policy. Public morals are affected, for good or ill, by the activities of… More

Judicial Usurpation and Sexual Liberation: Courts and the Abolition of Marriage

– Regent University Law Review 17:1 (Fall 2004). Reprinted as "High Courts and Misdemeanors" in Touchstone 17: 8 (October 2004), and in New Jersey Family Magazine (2005). Reprinted as "Judicial Usurpation: Perennial Temptation, Contemporary Challenge," in Bradley C. S. Watson (ed.), Ourselves and Our Posterity:  Essays in Constitutional Originalism (Lexington Books, 2009).
Judicial power can be used, and has been used, for both good and ill. In a basically just democratic republic, however, judicial power should never be exercised—even for desirable… More

Remarks on Public Morality

– University of St. Thomas, February 2, 2005, YouTube.
This lecture was given on February 2, 2005, as part of the University of St. Thomas Archbishop Michael J. Miller Lecture Series, sponsored by the Center for Catholic Studies, Sr. Paula Jean… More

The Wrong of Abortion

– In Andrew I. Cohen and Christopher H. Wellman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, 2005), with Patrick Lee. Reprinted in Carol Levine (ed.), Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bioethical Issues, 11th edition (McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2006).
Much of the public debate about abortion concerns the question whether deliberate feticide ought to be unlawful, at least in most circumstances. We will lay that question aside here in… More

The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market and Morals

– With Jean Bethke Elshtain, eds. Spence Publishing, 2006.
Description from Publisher: The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to… More

Private Acts, Public Interests

– First Things, February 2006.
Theorists of public morality “from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on” have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become… More

Restricting Reasons, Attenuating Discourse: Rawls, Habermas, and the Catholic Problem

– In Daniel N. Robinson, Gladys M. Sweeney, and Richard Gill (eds.), Human Nature and Its Wholeness (Catholic University of America Press, 2006). Reprinted with abridgments and additions as “Public Morality, Public Reason,” First Things, November, 2006.
A contest of worldviews in our time pits devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and other believers against secularist liberals and those who, while remaining within the religious… More

Law and Moral Purpose

– First Things, January 2008.
The obligations and purposes of law and government are to protect public health, safety, and morals, and to advance the general welfare” including, preeminently, protecting people’s… More

He Threw It All Away

– First Things, March 2009.
Excerpt: In the early 1970s, Lutheran pastor Richard John Neuhaus was poised to become the nation’s next great liberal public intellectual—the Reinhold Niebuhr of his generation. He had… More

Business and Family in a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In Samuel Gregg and James R. Stoner, Jr. (eds.), Profit, Prudence and Virtue:  Essays in Ethics, Business and Management (St. Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 2009). Also published in Rethinking Business Management (The Witherspoon Institute, 2008).

What is Marriage?

– Keynote address at The Wheatley Institution Conference on Defense of the Family: Natural Law Perspectives, Brigham Young University, January 27, 2011, YouTube.

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

– With Sherif Girgis and Ryan T. Anderson. Encounter Books, 2012.
Description from the Publisher: Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partner­ship: a male-female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends… More

Infanticide and madness

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
I am, of course, aware that infanticide was accepted and practiced in ancient Greece and Rome, and is still practiced (usually secretly, with winks and nods from public authorities, and… More

Is the Pro-Choice Position on Infanticide “Madness”?

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
As Charles Camosy observes, he and I agree more than we disagree. He believes with no less conviction than I do that deliberately killing infant children is profoundly morally wrong and a… More

A Second Look at First Things: A Case for Conservative Politics

– With F. Beckwith and S. McWilliams, eds., St. Augustine’s Press, 2013.
Excerpt: The conservative movement in America seems to have fallen on hard times. Even though conservative talk radio is at its height, and President Obama had to shift to the political… More

Conjugal Union: What Marriage Is and Why It Matters

– With Patrick Lee. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Description from the Publisher: This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man… More

Plough Interviews Robert P. George on Biblical Justice

– Plough Publishing, published October 8, 2014, YouTube.
Raised in West Virginia as the grandson of immigrant coal miners, Robert P. George is now McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. All the same, his renown as a public… More

What is Marriage? A Philosophic-Juridical Dialogue

– Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, November 20, 2014, YouTube.
How can one describe marriage from the philosophic and juridical point of view? What differentiates other types of unions? The two scholars respond briefly to these questions — Robert… More

Five Pillars of a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In James R. Stoner, Jr. and Harold James (eds.), The Thriving Society: On The Social Conditions of Human Flourishing (The Witherspoon Institute, 2015). First presented as the keynote address at John Paul II Australian Leaders Forum, Sydney, August 2012; Lecture in the Loyola University’s Centennial Celebration, March 2013; Keynote address at Sutherland Institute's 2013 Annual Dinner, April 2013; Lecture at Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture, September 2013.

The Constitution and Morality

– Eighth Annual Rosenkranz Debate at Federalist Society’s 2015 National Lawyers Convention, with John O. McGinnis, moderated by Hon. William H. Pryor Jr., introduced by Eugene B. Meyer, Washington DC, November 14, 2015, YouTube.

Essays

Social Cohesion and the Legal Enforcement of Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 35:1 (1990).
IN SEPTEMBER OF 1957, THE COMMITTEE on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution, chaired by Sir John Wolfenden, issued its Report recommending to the British Parliament that “homosexual… More

Conscience and the Public Person

– In Russell E. Smith (ed.), Catholic Conscience: Foundation and Formation (Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research Center, 1991).

Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays

– Oxford University Press, 1992.
Description from Publisher: Natural law theory is enjoying a revival of interest in a variety of scholarly disciplines including law, philosophy, political science, and theology and… More

The Moral Fragility of Constitutionalism

– First Things, January 1993.
Excerpt: In this collection of characteristically brilliant essays, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., one of our nation’s most eminent conservative political theorists, defends the American… More

Religious Liberty and Political Morality

– In Stephen Krason and Donald D'Elia (eds.), We Hold These Truths and More: Reflections on the American Proposition (University of Steubenville Press, 1993).

Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This work brings together leading defenders of Natural Law and Liberalism for a series of frank and lively exchanges touching upon critical issues of… More

The Autonomy of Law: Essays on Legal Positivism

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This collection of original essays from distinguished legal philosophers offers a challenging assessment of the nature and viability of legal positivism, an… More

Law, Democracy, and Moral Disagreement

– Harvard Law Review 110:7 (May 1997).
Reviewed Works: Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done about It by Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson; Legal Reasoning and Political… More

Making Children Moral: Pornography, Parents, and the Public Interest

– Arizona State Law Review 29 (Summer 1997). Reprinted in T. Campbell (ed.), International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory, 2nd Series (Dartmouth Publishing Co. and Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2003).
On two occasions in October of 1965, Sam Ginsberg, proprietor of Sam’s Stationery and Luncheonette in Bellmore, New York, sold magazines containing photographs of nude women to a… More

In Defense of Natural Law

– Oxford University Press, 1999.
Description from Publisher: In Making Men Moral, his 1995 book, George questioned the central doctrines of liberal jurisprudence and political theory. In his new work he extends his… More

Natural Law and Public Reason

– With Christopher Wolfe, eds. Georgetown University Press, 2000.
Description from Publisher: “Public reason” is one of the central concepts in modern liberal political theory. As articulated by John Rawls, it presents a way to overcome the… More

The Concept of Public Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 45:1 (2000). Reprinted in Craig Steven Titus (ed.), The Person and the Polis (Institute for the Psychological Sciences Press, 2006).
Public morality, like public health and safety, is a concern that goes beyond considerations of law and public policy. Public morals are affected, for good or ill, by the activities of… More

Judicial Usurpation and Sexual Liberation: Courts and the Abolition of Marriage

– Regent University Law Review 17:1 (Fall 2004). Reprinted as "High Courts and Misdemeanors" in Touchstone 17: 8 (October 2004), and in New Jersey Family Magazine (2005). Reprinted as "Judicial Usurpation: Perennial Temptation, Contemporary Challenge," in Bradley C. S. Watson (ed.), Ourselves and Our Posterity:  Essays in Constitutional Originalism (Lexington Books, 2009).
Judicial power can be used, and has been used, for both good and ill. In a basically just democratic republic, however, judicial power should never be exercised—even for desirable… More

Remarks on Public Morality

– University of St. Thomas, February 2, 2005, YouTube.
This lecture was given on February 2, 2005, as part of the University of St. Thomas Archbishop Michael J. Miller Lecture Series, sponsored by the Center for Catholic Studies, Sr. Paula Jean… More

The Wrong of Abortion

– In Andrew I. Cohen and Christopher H. Wellman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, 2005), with Patrick Lee. Reprinted in Carol Levine (ed.), Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bioethical Issues, 11th edition (McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2006).
Much of the public debate about abortion concerns the question whether deliberate feticide ought to be unlawful, at least in most circumstances. We will lay that question aside here in… More

The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market and Morals

– With Jean Bethke Elshtain, eds. Spence Publishing, 2006.
Description from Publisher: The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to… More

Private Acts, Public Interests

– First Things, February 2006.
Theorists of public morality “from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on” have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become… More

Restricting Reasons, Attenuating Discourse: Rawls, Habermas, and the Catholic Problem

– In Daniel N. Robinson, Gladys M. Sweeney, and Richard Gill (eds.), Human Nature and Its Wholeness (Catholic University of America Press, 2006). Reprinted with abridgments and additions as “Public Morality, Public Reason,” First Things, November, 2006.
A contest of worldviews in our time pits devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and other believers against secularist liberals and those who, while remaining within the religious… More

Law and Moral Purpose

– First Things, January 2008.
The obligations and purposes of law and government are to protect public health, safety, and morals, and to advance the general welfare” including, preeminently, protecting people’s… More

He Threw It All Away

– First Things, March 2009.
Excerpt: In the early 1970s, Lutheran pastor Richard John Neuhaus was poised to become the nation’s next great liberal public intellectual—the Reinhold Niebuhr of his generation. He had… More

Business and Family in a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In Samuel Gregg and James R. Stoner, Jr. (eds.), Profit, Prudence and Virtue:  Essays in Ethics, Business and Management (St. Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 2009). Also published in Rethinking Business Management (The Witherspoon Institute, 2008).

What is Marriage?

– Keynote address at The Wheatley Institution Conference on Defense of the Family: Natural Law Perspectives, Brigham Young University, January 27, 2011, YouTube.

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

– With Sherif Girgis and Ryan T. Anderson. Encounter Books, 2012.
Description from the Publisher: Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partner­ship: a male-female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends… More

Infanticide and madness

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
I am, of course, aware that infanticide was accepted and practiced in ancient Greece and Rome, and is still practiced (usually secretly, with winks and nods from public authorities, and… More

Is the Pro-Choice Position on Infanticide “Madness”?

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
As Charles Camosy observes, he and I agree more than we disagree. He believes with no less conviction than I do that deliberately killing infant children is profoundly morally wrong and a… More

A Second Look at First Things: A Case for Conservative Politics

– With F. Beckwith and S. McWilliams, eds., St. Augustine’s Press, 2013.
Excerpt: The conservative movement in America seems to have fallen on hard times. Even though conservative talk radio is at its height, and President Obama had to shift to the political… More

Conjugal Union: What Marriage Is and Why It Matters

– With Patrick Lee. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Description from the Publisher: This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man… More

Plough Interviews Robert P. George on Biblical Justice

– Plough Publishing, published October 8, 2014, YouTube.
Raised in West Virginia as the grandson of immigrant coal miners, Robert P. George is now McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. All the same, his renown as a public… More

What is Marriage? A Philosophic-Juridical Dialogue

– Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, November 20, 2014, YouTube.
How can one describe marriage from the philosophic and juridical point of view? What differentiates other types of unions? The two scholars respond briefly to these questions — Robert… More

Five Pillars of a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In James R. Stoner, Jr. and Harold James (eds.), The Thriving Society: On The Social Conditions of Human Flourishing (The Witherspoon Institute, 2015). First presented as the keynote address at John Paul II Australian Leaders Forum, Sydney, August 2012; Lecture in the Loyola University’s Centennial Celebration, March 2013; Keynote address at Sutherland Institute's 2013 Annual Dinner, April 2013; Lecture at Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture, September 2013.

The Constitution and Morality

– Eighth Annual Rosenkranz Debate at Federalist Society’s 2015 National Lawyers Convention, with John O. McGinnis, moderated by Hon. William H. Pryor Jr., introduced by Eugene B. Meyer, Washington DC, November 14, 2015, YouTube.

Commentary

Social Cohesion and the Legal Enforcement of Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 35:1 (1990).
IN SEPTEMBER OF 1957, THE COMMITTEE on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution, chaired by Sir John Wolfenden, issued its Report recommending to the British Parliament that “homosexual… More

Conscience and the Public Person

– In Russell E. Smith (ed.), Catholic Conscience: Foundation and Formation (Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research Center, 1991).

Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays

– Oxford University Press, 1992.
Description from Publisher: Natural law theory is enjoying a revival of interest in a variety of scholarly disciplines including law, philosophy, political science, and theology and… More

The Moral Fragility of Constitutionalism

– First Things, January 1993.
Excerpt: In this collection of characteristically brilliant essays, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., one of our nation’s most eminent conservative political theorists, defends the American… More

Religious Liberty and Political Morality

– In Stephen Krason and Donald D'Elia (eds.), We Hold These Truths and More: Reflections on the American Proposition (University of Steubenville Press, 1993).

Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This work brings together leading defenders of Natural Law and Liberalism for a series of frank and lively exchanges touching upon critical issues of… More

The Autonomy of Law: Essays on Legal Positivism

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This collection of original essays from distinguished legal philosophers offers a challenging assessment of the nature and viability of legal positivism, an… More

Law, Democracy, and Moral Disagreement

– Harvard Law Review 110:7 (May 1997).
Reviewed Works: Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done about It by Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson; Legal Reasoning and Political… More

Making Children Moral: Pornography, Parents, and the Public Interest

– Arizona State Law Review 29 (Summer 1997). Reprinted in T. Campbell (ed.), International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory, 2nd Series (Dartmouth Publishing Co. and Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2003).
On two occasions in October of 1965, Sam Ginsberg, proprietor of Sam’s Stationery and Luncheonette in Bellmore, New York, sold magazines containing photographs of nude women to a… More

In Defense of Natural Law

– Oxford University Press, 1999.
Description from Publisher: In Making Men Moral, his 1995 book, George questioned the central doctrines of liberal jurisprudence and political theory. In his new work he extends his… More

Natural Law and Public Reason

– With Christopher Wolfe, eds. Georgetown University Press, 2000.
Description from Publisher: “Public reason” is one of the central concepts in modern liberal political theory. As articulated by John Rawls, it presents a way to overcome the… More

The Concept of Public Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 45:1 (2000). Reprinted in Craig Steven Titus (ed.), The Person and the Polis (Institute for the Psychological Sciences Press, 2006).
Public morality, like public health and safety, is a concern that goes beyond considerations of law and public policy. Public morals are affected, for good or ill, by the activities of… More

Judicial Usurpation and Sexual Liberation: Courts and the Abolition of Marriage

– Regent University Law Review 17:1 (Fall 2004). Reprinted as "High Courts and Misdemeanors" in Touchstone 17: 8 (October 2004), and in New Jersey Family Magazine (2005). Reprinted as "Judicial Usurpation: Perennial Temptation, Contemporary Challenge," in Bradley C. S. Watson (ed.), Ourselves and Our Posterity:  Essays in Constitutional Originalism (Lexington Books, 2009).
Judicial power can be used, and has been used, for both good and ill. In a basically just democratic republic, however, judicial power should never be exercised—even for desirable… More

Remarks on Public Morality

– University of St. Thomas, February 2, 2005, YouTube.
This lecture was given on February 2, 2005, as part of the University of St. Thomas Archbishop Michael J. Miller Lecture Series, sponsored by the Center for Catholic Studies, Sr. Paula Jean… More

The Wrong of Abortion

– In Andrew I. Cohen and Christopher H. Wellman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, 2005), with Patrick Lee. Reprinted in Carol Levine (ed.), Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bioethical Issues, 11th edition (McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2006).
Much of the public debate about abortion concerns the question whether deliberate feticide ought to be unlawful, at least in most circumstances. We will lay that question aside here in… More

The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market and Morals

– With Jean Bethke Elshtain, eds. Spence Publishing, 2006.
Description from Publisher: The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to… More

Private Acts, Public Interests

– First Things, February 2006.
Theorists of public morality “from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on” have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become… More

Restricting Reasons, Attenuating Discourse: Rawls, Habermas, and the Catholic Problem

– In Daniel N. Robinson, Gladys M. Sweeney, and Richard Gill (eds.), Human Nature and Its Wholeness (Catholic University of America Press, 2006). Reprinted with abridgments and additions as “Public Morality, Public Reason,” First Things, November, 2006.
A contest of worldviews in our time pits devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and other believers against secularist liberals and those who, while remaining within the religious… More

Law and Moral Purpose

– First Things, January 2008.
The obligations and purposes of law and government are to protect public health, safety, and morals, and to advance the general welfare” including, preeminently, protecting people’s… More

He Threw It All Away

– First Things, March 2009.
Excerpt: In the early 1970s, Lutheran pastor Richard John Neuhaus was poised to become the nation’s next great liberal public intellectual—the Reinhold Niebuhr of his generation. He had… More

Business and Family in a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In Samuel Gregg and James R. Stoner, Jr. (eds.), Profit, Prudence and Virtue:  Essays in Ethics, Business and Management (St. Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 2009). Also published in Rethinking Business Management (The Witherspoon Institute, 2008).

What is Marriage?

– Keynote address at The Wheatley Institution Conference on Defense of the Family: Natural Law Perspectives, Brigham Young University, January 27, 2011, YouTube.

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

– With Sherif Girgis and Ryan T. Anderson. Encounter Books, 2012.
Description from the Publisher: Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partner­ship: a male-female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends… More

Infanticide and madness

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
I am, of course, aware that infanticide was accepted and practiced in ancient Greece and Rome, and is still practiced (usually secretly, with winks and nods from public authorities, and… More

Is the Pro-Choice Position on Infanticide “Madness”?

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
As Charles Camosy observes, he and I agree more than we disagree. He believes with no less conviction than I do that deliberately killing infant children is profoundly morally wrong and a… More

A Second Look at First Things: A Case for Conservative Politics

– With F. Beckwith and S. McWilliams, eds., St. Augustine’s Press, 2013.
Excerpt: The conservative movement in America seems to have fallen on hard times. Even though conservative talk radio is at its height, and President Obama had to shift to the political… More

Conjugal Union: What Marriage Is and Why It Matters

– With Patrick Lee. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Description from the Publisher: This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man… More

Plough Interviews Robert P. George on Biblical Justice

– Plough Publishing, published October 8, 2014, YouTube.
Raised in West Virginia as the grandson of immigrant coal miners, Robert P. George is now McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. All the same, his renown as a public… More

What is Marriage? A Philosophic-Juridical Dialogue

– Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, November 20, 2014, YouTube.
How can one describe marriage from the philosophic and juridical point of view? What differentiates other types of unions? The two scholars respond briefly to these questions — Robert… More

Five Pillars of a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In James R. Stoner, Jr. and Harold James (eds.), The Thriving Society: On The Social Conditions of Human Flourishing (The Witherspoon Institute, 2015). First presented as the keynote address at John Paul II Australian Leaders Forum, Sydney, August 2012; Lecture in the Loyola University’s Centennial Celebration, March 2013; Keynote address at Sutherland Institute's 2013 Annual Dinner, April 2013; Lecture at Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture, September 2013.

The Constitution and Morality

– Eighth Annual Rosenkranz Debate at Federalist Society’s 2015 National Lawyers Convention, with John O. McGinnis, moderated by Hon. William H. Pryor Jr., introduced by Eugene B. Meyer, Washington DC, November 14, 2015, YouTube.

Multimedia

Social Cohesion and the Legal Enforcement of Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 35:1 (1990).
IN SEPTEMBER OF 1957, THE COMMITTEE on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution, chaired by Sir John Wolfenden, issued its Report recommending to the British Parliament that “homosexual… More

Conscience and the Public Person

– In Russell E. Smith (ed.), Catholic Conscience: Foundation and Formation (Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research Center, 1991).

Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays

– Oxford University Press, 1992.
Description from Publisher: Natural law theory is enjoying a revival of interest in a variety of scholarly disciplines including law, philosophy, political science, and theology and… More

The Moral Fragility of Constitutionalism

– First Things, January 1993.
Excerpt: In this collection of characteristically brilliant essays, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., one of our nation’s most eminent conservative political theorists, defends the American… More

Religious Liberty and Political Morality

– In Stephen Krason and Donald D'Elia (eds.), We Hold These Truths and More: Reflections on the American Proposition (University of Steubenville Press, 1993).

Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This work brings together leading defenders of Natural Law and Liberalism for a series of frank and lively exchanges touching upon critical issues of… More

The Autonomy of Law: Essays on Legal Positivism

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This collection of original essays from distinguished legal philosophers offers a challenging assessment of the nature and viability of legal positivism, an… More

Law, Democracy, and Moral Disagreement

– Harvard Law Review 110:7 (May 1997).
Reviewed Works: Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done about It by Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson; Legal Reasoning and Political… More

Making Children Moral: Pornography, Parents, and the Public Interest

– Arizona State Law Review 29 (Summer 1997). Reprinted in T. Campbell (ed.), International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory, 2nd Series (Dartmouth Publishing Co. and Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2003).
On two occasions in October of 1965, Sam Ginsberg, proprietor of Sam’s Stationery and Luncheonette in Bellmore, New York, sold magazines containing photographs of nude women to a… More

In Defense of Natural Law

– Oxford University Press, 1999.
Description from Publisher: In Making Men Moral, his 1995 book, George questioned the central doctrines of liberal jurisprudence and political theory. In his new work he extends his… More

Natural Law and Public Reason

– With Christopher Wolfe, eds. Georgetown University Press, 2000.
Description from Publisher: “Public reason” is one of the central concepts in modern liberal political theory. As articulated by John Rawls, it presents a way to overcome the… More

The Concept of Public Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 45:1 (2000). Reprinted in Craig Steven Titus (ed.), The Person and the Polis (Institute for the Psychological Sciences Press, 2006).
Public morality, like public health and safety, is a concern that goes beyond considerations of law and public policy. Public morals are affected, for good or ill, by the activities of… More

Judicial Usurpation and Sexual Liberation: Courts and the Abolition of Marriage

– Regent University Law Review 17:1 (Fall 2004). Reprinted as "High Courts and Misdemeanors" in Touchstone 17: 8 (October 2004), and in New Jersey Family Magazine (2005). Reprinted as "Judicial Usurpation: Perennial Temptation, Contemporary Challenge," in Bradley C. S. Watson (ed.), Ourselves and Our Posterity:  Essays in Constitutional Originalism (Lexington Books, 2009).
Judicial power can be used, and has been used, for both good and ill. In a basically just democratic republic, however, judicial power should never be exercised—even for desirable… More

Remarks on Public Morality

– University of St. Thomas, February 2, 2005, YouTube.
This lecture was given on February 2, 2005, as part of the University of St. Thomas Archbishop Michael J. Miller Lecture Series, sponsored by the Center for Catholic Studies, Sr. Paula Jean… More

The Wrong of Abortion

– In Andrew I. Cohen and Christopher H. Wellman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, 2005), with Patrick Lee. Reprinted in Carol Levine (ed.), Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bioethical Issues, 11th edition (McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2006).
Much of the public debate about abortion concerns the question whether deliberate feticide ought to be unlawful, at least in most circumstances. We will lay that question aside here in… More

The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market and Morals

– With Jean Bethke Elshtain, eds. Spence Publishing, 2006.
Description from Publisher: The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to… More

Private Acts, Public Interests

– First Things, February 2006.
Theorists of public morality “from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on” have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become… More

Restricting Reasons, Attenuating Discourse: Rawls, Habermas, and the Catholic Problem

– In Daniel N. Robinson, Gladys M. Sweeney, and Richard Gill (eds.), Human Nature and Its Wholeness (Catholic University of America Press, 2006). Reprinted with abridgments and additions as “Public Morality, Public Reason,” First Things, November, 2006.
A contest of worldviews in our time pits devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and other believers against secularist liberals and those who, while remaining within the religious… More

Law and Moral Purpose

– First Things, January 2008.
The obligations and purposes of law and government are to protect public health, safety, and morals, and to advance the general welfare” including, preeminently, protecting people’s… More

He Threw It All Away

– First Things, March 2009.
Excerpt: In the early 1970s, Lutheran pastor Richard John Neuhaus was poised to become the nation’s next great liberal public intellectual—the Reinhold Niebuhr of his generation. He had… More

Business and Family in a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In Samuel Gregg and James R. Stoner, Jr. (eds.), Profit, Prudence and Virtue:  Essays in Ethics, Business and Management (St. Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 2009). Also published in Rethinking Business Management (The Witherspoon Institute, 2008).

What is Marriage?

– Keynote address at The Wheatley Institution Conference on Defense of the Family: Natural Law Perspectives, Brigham Young University, January 27, 2011, YouTube.

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

– With Sherif Girgis and Ryan T. Anderson. Encounter Books, 2012.
Description from the Publisher: Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partner­ship: a male-female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends… More

Infanticide and madness

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
I am, of course, aware that infanticide was accepted and practiced in ancient Greece and Rome, and is still practiced (usually secretly, with winks and nods from public authorities, and… More

Is the Pro-Choice Position on Infanticide “Madness”?

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
As Charles Camosy observes, he and I agree more than we disagree. He believes with no less conviction than I do that deliberately killing infant children is profoundly morally wrong and a… More

A Second Look at First Things: A Case for Conservative Politics

– With F. Beckwith and S. McWilliams, eds., St. Augustine’s Press, 2013.
Excerpt: The conservative movement in America seems to have fallen on hard times. Even though conservative talk radio is at its height, and President Obama had to shift to the political… More

Conjugal Union: What Marriage Is and Why It Matters

– With Patrick Lee. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Description from the Publisher: This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man… More

Plough Interviews Robert P. George on Biblical Justice

– Plough Publishing, published October 8, 2014, YouTube.
Raised in West Virginia as the grandson of immigrant coal miners, Robert P. George is now McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. All the same, his renown as a public… More

What is Marriage? A Philosophic-Juridical Dialogue

– Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, November 20, 2014, YouTube.
How can one describe marriage from the philosophic and juridical point of view? What differentiates other types of unions? The two scholars respond briefly to these questions — Robert… More

Five Pillars of a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In James R. Stoner, Jr. and Harold James (eds.), The Thriving Society: On The Social Conditions of Human Flourishing (The Witherspoon Institute, 2015). First presented as the keynote address at John Paul II Australian Leaders Forum, Sydney, August 2012; Lecture in the Loyola University’s Centennial Celebration, March 2013; Keynote address at Sutherland Institute's 2013 Annual Dinner, April 2013; Lecture at Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture, September 2013.

The Constitution and Morality

– Eighth Annual Rosenkranz Debate at Federalist Society’s 2015 National Lawyers Convention, with John O. McGinnis, moderated by Hon. William H. Pryor Jr., introduced by Eugene B. Meyer, Washington DC, November 14, 2015, YouTube.

Teaching

Social Cohesion and the Legal Enforcement of Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 35:1 (1990).
IN SEPTEMBER OF 1957, THE COMMITTEE on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution, chaired by Sir John Wolfenden, issued its Report recommending to the British Parliament that “homosexual… More

Conscience and the Public Person

– In Russell E. Smith (ed.), Catholic Conscience: Foundation and Formation (Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research Center, 1991).

Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays

– Oxford University Press, 1992.
Description from Publisher: Natural law theory is enjoying a revival of interest in a variety of scholarly disciplines including law, philosophy, political science, and theology and… More

The Moral Fragility of Constitutionalism

– First Things, January 1993.
Excerpt: In this collection of characteristically brilliant essays, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., one of our nation’s most eminent conservative political theorists, defends the American… More

Religious Liberty and Political Morality

– In Stephen Krason and Donald D'Elia (eds.), We Hold These Truths and More: Reflections on the American Proposition (University of Steubenville Press, 1993).

Natural Law, Liberalism, and Morality

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This work brings together leading defenders of Natural Law and Liberalism for a series of frank and lively exchanges touching upon critical issues of… More

The Autonomy of Law: Essays on Legal Positivism

– Oxford University Press, 1996.
Description from Publisher: This collection of original essays from distinguished legal philosophers offers a challenging assessment of the nature and viability of legal positivism, an… More

Law, Democracy, and Moral Disagreement

– Harvard Law Review 110:7 (May 1997).
Reviewed Works: Democracy and Disagreement: Why Moral Conflict Cannot Be Avoided in Politics, and What Should Be Done about It by Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson; Legal Reasoning and Political… More

Making Children Moral: Pornography, Parents, and the Public Interest

– Arizona State Law Review 29 (Summer 1997). Reprinted in T. Campbell (ed.), International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory, 2nd Series (Dartmouth Publishing Co. and Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 2003).
On two occasions in October of 1965, Sam Ginsberg, proprietor of Sam’s Stationery and Luncheonette in Bellmore, New York, sold magazines containing photographs of nude women to a… More

In Defense of Natural Law

– Oxford University Press, 1999.
Description from Publisher: In Making Men Moral, his 1995 book, George questioned the central doctrines of liberal jurisprudence and political theory. In his new work he extends his… More

Natural Law and Public Reason

– With Christopher Wolfe, eds. Georgetown University Press, 2000.
Description from Publisher: “Public reason” is one of the central concepts in modern liberal political theory. As articulated by John Rawls, it presents a way to overcome the… More

The Concept of Public Morality

– American Journal of Jurisprudence 45:1 (2000). Reprinted in Craig Steven Titus (ed.), The Person and the Polis (Institute for the Psychological Sciences Press, 2006).
Public morality, like public health and safety, is a concern that goes beyond considerations of law and public policy. Public morals are affected, for good or ill, by the activities of… More

Judicial Usurpation and Sexual Liberation: Courts and the Abolition of Marriage

– Regent University Law Review 17:1 (Fall 2004). Reprinted as "High Courts and Misdemeanors" in Touchstone 17: 8 (October 2004), and in New Jersey Family Magazine (2005). Reprinted as "Judicial Usurpation: Perennial Temptation, Contemporary Challenge," in Bradley C. S. Watson (ed.), Ourselves and Our Posterity:  Essays in Constitutional Originalism (Lexington Books, 2009).
Judicial power can be used, and has been used, for both good and ill. In a basically just democratic republic, however, judicial power should never be exercised—even for desirable… More

Remarks on Public Morality

– University of St. Thomas, February 2, 2005, YouTube.
This lecture was given on February 2, 2005, as part of the University of St. Thomas Archbishop Michael J. Miller Lecture Series, sponsored by the Center for Catholic Studies, Sr. Paula Jean… More

The Wrong of Abortion

– In Andrew I. Cohen and Christopher H. Wellman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, 2005), with Patrick Lee. Reprinted in Carol Levine (ed.), Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bioethical Issues, 11th edition (McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2006).
Much of the public debate about abortion concerns the question whether deliberate feticide ought to be unlawful, at least in most circumstances. We will lay that question aside here in… More

The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market and Morals

– With Jean Bethke Elshtain, eds. Spence Publishing, 2006.
Description from Publisher: The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to… More

Private Acts, Public Interests

– First Things, February 2006.
Theorists of public morality “from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on” have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become… More

Restricting Reasons, Attenuating Discourse: Rawls, Habermas, and the Catholic Problem

– In Daniel N. Robinson, Gladys M. Sweeney, and Richard Gill (eds.), Human Nature and Its Wholeness (Catholic University of America Press, 2006). Reprinted with abridgments and additions as “Public Morality, Public Reason,” First Things, November, 2006.
A contest of worldviews in our time pits devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and other believers against secularist liberals and those who, while remaining within the religious… More

Law and Moral Purpose

– First Things, January 2008.
The obligations and purposes of law and government are to protect public health, safety, and morals, and to advance the general welfare” including, preeminently, protecting people’s… More

He Threw It All Away

– First Things, March 2009.
Excerpt: In the early 1970s, Lutheran pastor Richard John Neuhaus was poised to become the nation’s next great liberal public intellectual—the Reinhold Niebuhr of his generation. He had… More

Business and Family in a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In Samuel Gregg and James R. Stoner, Jr. (eds.), Profit, Prudence and Virtue:  Essays in Ethics, Business and Management (St. Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 2009). Also published in Rethinking Business Management (The Witherspoon Institute, 2008).

What is Marriage?

– Keynote address at The Wheatley Institution Conference on Defense of the Family: Natural Law Perspectives, Brigham Young University, January 27, 2011, YouTube.

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

– With Sherif Girgis and Ryan T. Anderson. Encounter Books, 2012.
Description from the Publisher: Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partner­ship: a male-female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends… More

Infanticide and madness

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
I am, of course, aware that infanticide was accepted and practiced in ancient Greece and Rome, and is still practiced (usually secretly, with winks and nods from public authorities, and… More

Is the Pro-Choice Position on Infanticide “Madness”?

– Journal of Medical Ethics 39:5 (May 2013).
As Charles Camosy observes, he and I agree more than we disagree. He believes with no less conviction than I do that deliberately killing infant children is profoundly morally wrong and a… More

A Second Look at First Things: A Case for Conservative Politics

– With F. Beckwith and S. McWilliams, eds., St. Augustine’s Press, 2013.
Excerpt: The conservative movement in America seems to have fallen on hard times. Even though conservative talk radio is at its height, and President Obama had to shift to the political… More

Conjugal Union: What Marriage Is and Why It Matters

– With Patrick Lee. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Description from the Publisher: This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man… More

Plough Interviews Robert P. George on Biblical Justice

– Plough Publishing, published October 8, 2014, YouTube.
Raised in West Virginia as the grandson of immigrant coal miners, Robert P. George is now McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University. All the same, his renown as a public… More

What is Marriage? A Philosophic-Juridical Dialogue

– Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, November 20, 2014, YouTube.
How can one describe marriage from the philosophic and juridical point of view? What differentiates other types of unions? The two scholars respond briefly to these questions — Robert… More

Five Pillars of a Decent and Dynamic Society

– In James R. Stoner, Jr. and Harold James (eds.), The Thriving Society: On The Social Conditions of Human Flourishing (The Witherspoon Institute, 2015). First presented as the keynote address at John Paul II Australian Leaders Forum, Sydney, August 2012; Lecture in the Loyola University’s Centennial Celebration, March 2013; Keynote address at Sutherland Institute's 2013 Annual Dinner, April 2013; Lecture at Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture, September 2013.

The Constitution and Morality

– Eighth Annual Rosenkranz Debate at Federalist Society’s 2015 National Lawyers Convention, with John O. McGinnis, moderated by Hon. William H. Pryor Jr., introduced by Eugene B. Meyer, Washington DC, November 14, 2015, YouTube.