Legal prejudices to sylogism. A confusion between form and conent

Abstract

This text holds that some of the prejudices and preventions to the use of legal syllogism, as the way of reasoning or making legal decisions, result from a confusion in comprehension of what a syllogistic reasoning is. Independently from the attitude which the legal order is assumed with, either as a group of standards that should uncontrovertibly be obeyed, or as the progressive human attempt of leading the individual actions toward justice, the use of syllogism does not condemn the incontrovertible religiosity of standards, and does not enervate the ideals of justice embodied in the law. To show this fact, critics to legal syllogism will be located within the context of legal positivism vs legal iusnaturalism discussion. Syllogistic reasoning will be described, and how such reasoning, once included within the legal scope, is specified as legal syllogisms. Finally, it will be debated that censure to syllogism as a way of legal argumentation, comes from the inability to distinguish between form and content of argumentations. Syllogism use in the field of law is promissory, since it is a valid structure of thought, a scheme of effective reasoning which is not exclusive of a doctrine or ideology of the law.