Introduction
Lon Luvois Fuller (1902–1978) was an important figure in American Contract Law, particularly due to his work on contract damages (Fuller and Perdue 1936, 1937) and his innovative casebook (Gerber 2003), as well as being an influential early writer on alternative dispute resolution (Fuller 1981). Within legal philosophy, he was an insightful critic of some aspects of American legal realism (Fuller 1934), but his greatest influence came from his procedural natural law theory and his criticisms of legal positivism, both exemplified in a famous debate with H. L. A. Hart in the Harvard Law Review (Fuller 1958; Hart 1958).
Main Text
Fuller criticized legal positivism (perhaps unfairly) as treating law merely as an object for quasi-scientific study rather than as a process or a function; and as portraying law as a “one-way projection of authority” (Fuller 1969: 192), when it is better understood, he argued, in terms of reciprocity between officials and citizens. His most...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Fuller L (1934) American legal realism. U Pa L Rev 82:429–462
Fuller L (1958) Positivism and fidelity to law – a response to professor Hart. Harv L Rev 71:630–672
Fuller L (1969) The morality of law (rev ed). Yale University Press, New Haven
Fuller L (1981) The principles of social order (ed Winston KI) Duke University Press, Durham
Fuller LL, Perdue WR Jr (1936, 1937) The reliance interest in contract damages (Parts I and II). Yale LJ 46: 52–96, 373–420
Gerber SD (2003) Corbin and Fuller’s Cases on contracts (1942?): the casebook that never was. Fordham L Rev 72:595–656
Hart HLA (1958) Positivism and the separation of law and morals. Harv L Rev 71:593–629
Hart HLA (1983) Essays in jurisprudence and philosophy. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Hart HM Jr, Sacks AM (1994) The legal process (eds Eskridge WN Jr, Frickey PP) Foundation Press, New York
Kramer MK (1998) Scrupulousness without scruples: a critique of Lon Fuller and his defenders. OJLS 18:235–263
Rundle K (2012) Forms liberate: reclaiming the jurisprudence of Lon L. Fuller. Hart Publishing, Oxford
Summers RS (1984) Lon L. Fuller. Stanford University Press, Stanford
Symposium on Lon Fuller (1994) Law Phil 13: 253–418
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature B.V.
About this entry
Cite this entry
Bix, B.H. (2019). Fuller, Lon L.. In: Sellers, M., Kirste, S. (eds) Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6730-0_606-1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6730-0_606-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-6730-0
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-6730-0
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Law and CriminologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences