Bill Watson

Excited to see my paper "What Are We Debating When We Debate Legal Interpretation?" published today in the B.U. L. Rev. (@bulawreview.bsky.social)! Published next to it is a terrific and constructive response by Francisco Urbina. Both the paper and the response are here: www.bu.edu/bulawreview/...

Emad Atiq has a terrific new book on general jurisprudence. Published in the Cambridge Elements in Philosophy of Law series, the book offers a concise articulation and defense of legal non-positivism.

You can read my review of the book in JOTWELL: juris.jotwell.com/non-frilly-n...

Varsava on Substance and Procedure, buff.ly/vjaVZeG(Univ... - Nina Varsava (University of Wisconsin-Madison) has posted The Nature of Substance and Procedure on SSRN.

Krishnakumar on Practical Consequences and Statutory Interpretation, buff.ly/MEfDTgy - Anita S. Krishnakumar (Georgetown University Law Center) has posted Practical Consequences in Statutory Interpretation (139 Harv. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming)) on SSRN.

Very grateful to Nina Varsava for her generous review in JOTWELL of my forthcoming paper "The Plain-Meaning Fallacy"!

In any event, if I’ve misinterpreted Baude and Sachs's views (@stephenesachs.bsky.social), then I hope that they’ll correct me! And I’m very grateful to Evan for his comments on my work. A link to my paper is below, and further objections or comments are very welcome! 11/11

ssrn.com/abstract=514...

Premise (1) is false insofar as “original meaning” includes unplain original meaning because unplain original meaning is not the law. And (2) is false because, even if unplain original meaning were the law, judges would have no prima facie moral duty to enforce it (or so I argue in the paper). 10/11

Even though that argument is not express in Baude and Sachs’s joint work, I take it to be part of the background motivation for their joint project. And I want to challenge both their descriptive premise (i.e., premise 1) and their normative premise (i.e., premise 2). 9/11

Baude makes roughly the following argument (in his “Is Originalism Our Law?”):

(1) Original meaning is the law.
(2) Judges have a prima facie moral duty to enforce the law.
(C) Thus, judges have a prima facie moral duty to enforce original meaning.

8/11

Evan makes a further point: he observes that Baude and Sachs make a descriptive claim about what our law is, not a normative argument about what judges should do. Again, I interpret Baude and Sachs differently. 7/11

Still, I interpret Baude and Sachs differently than Evan does. They seem to think that originalism can fully resolve a great deal of constitutional litigation. But if originalism is limited to enforcing just *plain* original meaning, then that won’t be the case (or so I argue in the paper). 6/11

Evan thinks that that conclusion is “probably right”: “un-plain OPM is not our law.” To my mind, that’s the important point! Evan’s objection is that Baude and Sachs might not disagree with me. If so, then perhaps I’m just pushing Baude and Sachs to clarify their views. 5/11

To be clear, my main goal in this part of the paper is not so much to critique Baude and Sachs as to explain why an argument like theirs cannot show that *unplain* original meaning is our law. If originalism requires enforcing unplain original meaning, then originalism is not our law. 4/11

Evan focuses on my critique of one particular justification for originalism: the argument, most prominently associated with Will Baude and Steve Sachs, that originalism is “our law.” Evan suggests that I attribute a stronger position to Baude and Sachs than they actually take. 3/11

My paper argues that none of the leading justifications for originalism can justify enforcing less than plain original meaning—i.e., none can justify enforcing original meaning whose content or application to the case at hand is subject to reasonable dispute. 2/11

Thanks to Evan Bernick (@evanbernick.bsky.social) for generously engaging with my draft paper “The Plain-Meaning Fallacy” on the Originalism Blog. I’m pleased that Evan and I agree about so much! Here’s a short 🧵 responding to him.

originalismblog.typepad.com/the-original...

I'm grateful to Mike Ramsey for engaging with my forthcoming paper "The Plain-Meaning Fallacy" on the Originalism Blog and for giving me an opportunity to respond. My response is here:

originalismblog.typepad.com/the-original...

Watson on Originalism and Plain Meaning, buff.ly/WfpqAiY - Bill Watson (University of Illinois College of Law) has posted The Plain-Meaning Fallacy (Boston College L. Rev. (forthcoming 2026)) on SSRN.

Grateful to Michael Ramsey for highlighting my paper "What Are We Debating When We Debate Legal Interpretation" on the Originalism Blog:

originalismblog.typepad.com/the-original...

Wow, I'm grateful and honored to get such high praise from lsolum.bsky.social!

Thanks, Francisco!

My article "What Are We Debating When We Debate Legal Interpretation?" is now on SSRN and is forthcoming in the BU Law Review. Comments and objections are very welcome!

papers.ssrn.com/abstract_id=...

I'm thrilled that my article "The Plain-Meaning Fallacy" is forthcoming in the Boston College L. Rev. A draft is on SSRN: papers.ssrn.com/abstract_id=...

It's still a work in progress, so comments and objections are more than welcome!

Clarifying Legal Validity - Jurisprudence Thomas Adams, Criteria of Validity, __ Mod. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming 2025), available at SSRN (Oct. 14, 2024).Alma DiamondMy father used to announce weekly household chore assignments on Sundays. The…

Diamond on Adams, Clarifying Legal Validity - Jurisprudence https://buff.ly/4hXfH6F

Thanks lsolum.bsky.social for the "Highly recommended"!

I highly recommend reading “Law Is a Moral Practice.” It’s an entertaining, thought-provoking, and refreshingly accessible book.

And if you want my two cents on the book’s titular claim, here’s the link to my review again. 6/6

journals.library.wustl.edu/jurisprudenc...

Inculcating this form of moral expertise in students is something that comes naturally to law professors. But, thanks to Hershovitz, I now approach the task more consciously and explicitly, explaining to students why we practice asking these kinds of questions. 5/6

Lawyers don't have a monopoly on this form of moral expertise, but it does characterize our profession. It's because of this expertise that people value lawyers not just for their knowledge of statutes, regulations, and the like, but also for their advice and sound judgment. 4/6

Those are very lawyerly questions: they’re the sort of questions that students form the habit of asking in law school. Hershovitz explains that one of the functions of a legal education is to instill in future lawyers a disposition to ask these morally nuanced questions. 3/6

Hershovitz argues that lawyers have a distinctive and limited form of moral expertise. Lawyers are trained to ask questions like: Who should make this decision? How should past decisions bear on the present? How will present decisions bear on the future? Etc., etc. 2/6