Jurist:A nation’s laws must be viewed as expressions of a moral code

Although nation's law have some conflit but it removed as a exception so the option E is best option amoung others but not correct.

Pls give Kudos if agree, Pls suggest if any considers this reasoning wroung

Hi, can someone explain why B is not a right answer? I narrowed the choices to B & E, but chose B

Hi Abhishek31, passage telling that basic of nation is it's moral code. Also law creates exception in favor of moral code. I.e law could never deviate from moral code, which option b makes mistake off. Hope it helps. Pls kudos

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Dear experts, can you please help decode the problem? I even have hard time understanding the meaning of the conclusion. Thank you in advance!

Hi all,

Why is C incorrect? As I understand from the stimuli, almost all time (mentioned in the last sentence) moral behaviour and compliance with laws are indistinguishable because one relies on the other.

Thanks

Hi folks,
From my understanding, Jurist says that laws must be treated as moral codes.
Since moral codes are something that are preferred/acceptable to the society, there will be less confusion among people when presented different laws, which could be seen as moral codes.
Now comes the most tricky part of the argument. “Thus, any moral prohibition against the violation of statutes must leave room for exceptions”.
Let’s think about Robin Hood. Stealing from riches and giving to poor. Stealing is wrong morally and in the eyes of law as well. But even then it does seem right and majority of the people do accept it exceptionally.
That’s what E is trying to say.

I could be wrong. I took 2:40 mins to get it right. It was not easy to comprehend the language (though I am still not sure, whether I understood it correctly). If anyone could help/guide me to comprehend such passages, that’d be great and I’d appreciate such help.

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This is an inference question so let's break down the argument into premises to easily choose one of the options that can be inferred given the premises:

1ºPremise: laws -> expression of moral code that is more important than the laws
2ºPremise: moral code -> adequacy of laws
3ºPremise: moral code -> allows sound basis to choose a specific set of laws or others
4ºPremise: violation -> room for exceptions

Ok, so the argument is basically telling us that moral code should be over laws because this allows socities to flexibly choose their own set of laws and this also enables that any violation is subject to interpretation

(A) Those who formulate statutes are not primarily concerned with morality when they do so.

The argument doesn't say anything whether those who formulate statutes are concerned with morality or not. Incorrect

(B) Sometimes criteria other than the criteria derived frm a moral code should be used in choosing one set of laws over another.

It says that moral code should be the criteria and not just the set of laws. Incorrect

(C) Unless it is legally forbidden ever to violate some moral rules, moral behavior and compliance with laws are indistinguishable.

Out of scope. morality and compliance with laws are distinguishable (that's why they have room for exceptions). Incorrect

(D) There is no statute that a nation’s citizens have a moral obligation to obey.

We don't know that from the argument. It can be a yes or a no. Incorrect

(E) A nation’s laws can sometimes come into conflict with the moral code they express

This is our answer. Since moral code and laws are distinguishable., they can come into conflict sometimes. Correct

OPTION E

Amazing question!

Argument - Consider there two be 5 laws: Law A, Law B,Law C, Law D, Law E. Moral code has a higher ground compared to nation's laws. Because of the higher ground:
1. Moral code can decide which law to give a higher preference. Say Law B can be given a higher preference than law C depending on a particular case.
2. However, the same preference can have exceptions in some other circumstances - Thus any particular case of preference will always leave some room for exceptions.

(A) Those who formulate statutes are not primarily concerned with morality when they do so.
- This is irrelevant.

(B) Sometimes criteria other than the criteria derived from a moral code should be used in choosing one set of laws over another.
- We cannot definitively say such things. Neither is a word always used nor is any phrase indicating presence of other criteria used.
- Wrong

(C) Unless it is legally forbidden ever to violate some moral rules, moral behavior and compliance with laws are indistinguishable.
- We are not aware of the condition in case "moral rules" are violated. We do know the case of violation of legal rules.
- Wrong

(D) There is no statute that a nation’s citizens have a moral obligation to obey.
- Tricky, but wrong
- The argument says that moral code will decide which legal law has a preference over other. Thus, using moral code we may be able to provide a legal law as having the highest preference over all the other laws.
- For instance, moral code may place "law against killing" as having the highest preference over others.
- However, we can argue that "law against killing" can also take a secondary preference when applied to miscreants.
- Wrong

(E) A nation’s laws can sometimes come into conflict with the moral code they express.
- If law A asks for a particular action and moral code denies that action on moral grounds --> law is in conflict with moral code
- Correct

Jurist: A nation’s laws must be viewed as expressions of a moral code that transcends those laws and serves as a measure of their adequacy. Otherwise, a society can have no sound basis for preferring any given set of laws to all others. Thus, any moral prohibition against the violation of statutes must leave room for exceptions.

Which one of the following can be properly inferred from the jurist’s statements?