Abstract

This chapter argues that the role of a judge consists of obligations to apply the law, obligations to improve the law, and obligations to protect the law. It defends this view against a competing suggestion by Michael Moore, who claims that, when acting judicially, judges are always obligated to apply the law, and the law alone. I argue that this depends on an incorrect view of the relationship between social roles and moral obligations, and an unacceptably capacious view of what the law is. I conclude by asking whether there is nonetheless room to make a “conceptual choice” to see law as Moore thinks of it, or a reason to reform the concept of law along such lines. I reject both ideas. There are fewer “conceptual choices” in jurisprudence than some people think.