The Cross Section - RMB Blog

  The Ethics Of Liberty by Murray Rothbard As the title suggests the whole chapter is about these two types of law.  There are several distinctions between natural law and positive law, even though there can be some overlap.  To start,  positive law is any law that has been written down and enacted by a government.  It is man made.  Natural law is not man made.  It is not always written down or enacted by government.  It exists even when there is no government in existence as it is a part of God's created order. Positive laws can be just or unjust because they have no basis other than the whims of rulers.  Natural law is never unjust because it is based on human nature, logic, and objective, absolute values.  Therefore, natural law is able to critique positive laws and those rulers who enact them.                 "the very existence of natural law ... is a potentially  powerful threat to the                      status quo and a standing reproach to the reign of ... the Stat

  In chapter 2, Rothbard explains the basis of natural law and why it is important.  He also continues to address skeptics' objections. Part of accepting the existence of natural law is accepting the fact that everything in existence has a nature.  That nature determines the attributes of the things and also how different things interact with one another.  Philosophically the nature of a thing can also be thought of as a Platonic form.  There is a form of a chair which is the ideal chair.  The form represents perfectly what a chair is supposed to be and what it is supposed to do.  All chairs in existence are linked to the form as imperfect examples of it.  So the form of chair specifies the attributes that all chairs share, including their proper use.  You could also call it the natural law of chairs .  Particular chairs are examples of the universal form.  No two chairs are exactly the same, but they are all chairs.                 "The world, in fact, consists of a myriad n