Document Type
Article - On Campus Only
Publication Date
2006
Abstract
This essay argues against legal, political, and ethical justifications for torture. In the expository sections of the essay, I juxtapose international prohibitions against torture with the current U.S. administration's justifications for harsh interrogation methods on the basis of military necessity and presidential prerogative. I examine the systematic and individual causes of the specific abuses at Abu Ghraib that were tantamount to torture. In the constructive sections of the essay, I retrieve the evolving standards of decency from Supreme Court cases and jus cogens peremptory norms from international law. I contend that torture is deontologically wrong and that the administration's arguments on solely teleological grounds are ethically flawed and contradictory. Engaging numerous interlocutors in law, philosophy, and Christian ethics, I reconceptualize the rule of law in terms of moral vision and an emerging moral consensus, and I hold that these terms provide a more adequate framework for evaluating and repudiating the practice of torture.
Digital Commons @ LMU & LLS Citation
Rothchild, Jonathan. “Moral Consensus, the Rule of Law, and the Practice of Torture.” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, vol. 26, no. 2, 2006.
