The Anthology of Swiss Legal Culture

 

Cluster "Philosophy of Law and General Jurisprudence"

 

2^nd Section "Legal Methodology and Scientific Character of Jurisprudence, or: Contro­versy Between Positivism and Natural Law, Between Monism and Dualism, and the Pluralist Alternative of Human Studies"

 

Entry 2.3a "Arnold Gysin, Naturrechtslehre und Rechtspositivismus"

 

Selected, Elaborated and Discussed by Michael Walter Hebeisen

 

 

 

Author: Arnold Gysin

 

Title: Naturrecht und Positivität des Rechts

 

Edition(s): in: Rechts­­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begeg­nung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frank­furt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969), pp. 48-81

 

 

 

[Introduction/Historical Situation and Systematic Context]

 

Arnold Gysin intended originally to promote at the University of Berne with a legal philosophical thesis with Eugen Huber; however, the latter delegated him to his younger colleague Walther Burckhardt who remained his mentor until his death (“Die Lehre vom Naturrecht bei Leonhard Nelson und das Natur­recht der Aufklärung”). The interest of Gysin has been directed towards the critique of jurisprudence as it had been addressed by Leonard Nelson, who originated from Low-Saxony and represented a key figure in the domain of German legal thought (please consult his well-known principal writing: Die Rechtswissenschaft ohne Recht – Kritische Betrachtungen über die Grundlagen des Staats- und Völkerrechts, insbesondere über die Lehre von der Souveränität, Leipzig: Veit & Comp., 1917). Nelson principally counts to the Kantian and therefore idealistic current within legal philosophy, however he stands for a third orientation, going back to the Immanuel Kant-scholar Jakob Friedrich Fries. These relations turned out to be very important in order to understand the general attitude of Gysin towards jurisprudence and legal philosophy.

 

Jakob Friedrich Fries (refugeed in Switzerland during the so-called Helvetik period) distinguished apprehension radically from reason, and thereby he criticised the critique of reason and cognition, as it had been established by Immanuel Kant. In the understanding of Fries, reason was not to be considered as lucid and enlightened but rather as dark, turbid, and partially unconscious. Based on such concrete insights, philosophy has to build a system of metaphysics by reflecting these pieces of conscious reason and to identify principles. Such a critique of reason is grounded in psychological analysis, i.e. the psychological approach is integrated into theoretical philosophy. Generally, reason is only to be considered as conscious, where it is accompanied by concrete application and illustrated by conception or perception. Fries had Carl Gustav Jung among his students at the University of Jena, the grandfather of the psychoanalyst with the very same name; the family Jung had to emigrate to Switzerland, and Jung was asked to reorganise the Faculty of medicine at the University of Basel, recommended by Alexander von Humboldt.

 

The basic conviction of Jakob Friedrich Fries lies in the systematics of legal philosophy. Every philosophical reflection is declared to be natural law in effect and, therefore, a philosophical enlightened jurisprudence equals a critique of positive legal order. Critisism, however, is also addressed to natural law theory, and the general intention consists in founding a renewed natural law theory, in consequence. These thoughts show all um already in the title of the principal writing in case: “Philosophische Rechtslehre und Kritik aller positiven Gesetzgebung, mit Beleuchtung der gewöhnlichen Fehler in der Bearbeitung des Naturrechts” (Jena: Johann Michael Mauke, 1803; reprint in: Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9: Schriften zur angewandten Philosophie, vol. 1, Aalen: Scientia, 1971). This work is highly recommended for further reading...

 

Leonard Nelson has been attracted by the so-called Fries school early in his career and decidedly defended the philosophical character of the practical philosophical applications of the psychological inclined theory of cognition. In constant dispute and controversy with the rich number of Fries scholars, representing the savant intelligence of his time, Nelson proposed an application of the moral philosophy to legal thought. As a communist, converted to a socialist or socio-democratic Nelson established on the basis of this philosophical orientation a profoundly cardinal and categoric criticism of virtually all currents of legal thought. And his critique mainly of positivistic inclinations has been heard and discussed vividly in his time. We do not consider as Nelson’s principal writing his polemic, yet militant “Jurisprudence Without Law”, but rather his extended and comprehensive “System der philosophischen Rechtslehre und Politik” (the 3^rd vol. of: Vorlesungen über die Grundlagen der Ethik, Leipzig: Peter Reinhold, 1924), a book that is recommended for further reading.

 

Let us briefly reconsider the practical philosophical background of this critique that has his foundations in a certain view of ethical and moral claims. This connection and intimate relation are founded in natural law theory, now gently modernised and not practised in the old school manner. The intention is to direct normative claims of all kinds towards a material and value based normative theory that includes the legal order as well as the Kantian moral law (“Sittengesetz” or “Moralgesetz”). Thereby duty-based normative theory is complemented by a novel value-based normative order. This approach, however, does not directly leads to the so-called “materiale Wert-Ethik” by Max Scheler or Nicolai Hartmann, but rather to a revival of natural law theory, which is highly problematic in terms of the heritage of Kantianism as philosophical modernism (and ultimately on a basis of protestant ethics).

 

 

 

[Content, Abstracts/Conclusions, Insights, Evidence]

 

Arnold Gysin’s interest is clearly focused on the question of the application of the legal order. The structure of legal order is routed in postulates: “Sie sind allgemeine Bedingungen, die erfüllt sein müssen, um das ‘Rechtsgesetz’, oder wie man es in der Rechtsphilosophie öfters nennt, das ‘ungeschriebene Gesetz’ auf das Ganze einer menschlichen Gesellschaft überhaupt erst anwenden zu können. Die Postulate sind [...] ‘Anforderungen, die an den Zustand einer Gesellschaft zu stellen sind, damit er ein Rechtszustand zu heissen verdient’” (Zur Rechtsphilosophie von Jakob Friedrich Fries und Leonard Nelson, in: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969, p 153). It turns out, in conclusion, that “die Bedingungen der Rechtlichkeit einer Gesellschaft (Nelson) oder die regulativen Leitlinien, nach denen sich die menschliche Gesellschaft allmählich den Forderungen der Gerechtigkeit annähern kann (Fries), dem Sinn nach nichts anderes bedeuten als das, was Juristen und Rechtsphilosophen heute als ‘Rechtsidee’ bezeichnen. Dabei liegt das Schwergewicht in der Fries-Nelsonschen Fassung auf der Sichtbarmachung einiger von historischen Besonderheiten unabhängiger Strukturen der Rechtsordnung und der für ihre inhaltliche Ausgestaltung massgebenden Grundprinzipien”. These reflections indicate the general setting of the legal philosophical thought of Gysin.

 

As leading text by Arnold Gysin, we have selected the essay on “Naturrecht und Positivität des Rechts”, where the traditional misunderstandings of natural law theory are addressed and identified as rationalism, anarchism, abstraction and formalism. As so-called material principles of legal and social order, foundationalism, equality and natural positivism are highlighted. The core concept seems to be positivism in an understanding of natural law theory and within the Thomist tradition. The positivity of legal order means directly the elimination of natural law theory, according to Gysin. “Man beachte aber, dass diese Aufhebung des Naturrechts, die in einer fertig gebildeten Rechtsordnung auf der ganzen Linie erfolgen muss, durch eine rein naturrechtliche Überlegung begründet ist, durch welche das naturrechtliche Denken als solches nicht aufgehoben wird: Die Idee der Positivität ist hier gedacht als Präzisierung des Gerechten. Und nicht aus dem Willensursprung als solchem, sondern aus der inhaltlichen Gerechtigkeit fliesst nach wie vor die verbindliche Kraft der polisitiven Bestimmung. Mit anderen Worten: das materiale Prinzip des Rechts bildet die feste Schranke der Positivität [...] / Das heisst für uns, dass auch nach der Ablehnung des Naturrechts das naturrechtliche Denken bestehen bleibt als die Methode der Rechtserkenntnis (oder der Rechtsfindung, was im Grund dasselbe bedeutet)”. Looking back, this differentiation of natural law and its implementation into positivist legal thought (as a kind of natural law methodology) seems to be highly problematic, however.

 

These arguments have to be completed by those put forward by Arnold Gysin in two other essays, entitled “Grundlagen des Naturrechts und des Rechtspositivismus”, and “Rechtsphilosophie und Jurisprudenz”, respectively, that can be considered as a trilogy of fundamental essays (se nos. 2.3b and 1.7), altogether trying to revitalise natural law theory in order to overcome predomination positivism, however not in a Catholic or Scholastic tradition, but on the basis of modified Kantianism and Fichteanism (whereas in Jakob Friedrich Fries reason is routed in the un-conscious, in Johann Gottlieb Fichte critical cognition is founded in self-consciousness).

 

 

 

[Further Information About the Author]

 

Arnold Gysin, born 29 August 1897 in Basel, died 13 October 1980 in Lucerne, obtained his doctorate in 1923 at the University of Berne, before practicing as a lawyer in Zurich and Lucerne. From 1924 to 1934 he was a private lecturer at the University of Basel. Between 1952 and 1968, he was a federal judge at the insurance court, in the years 1960 and 1961 its president.

 

 

 

[Selected Works of the Same Author]

 

Arnold Gysin: Die Lehre vom Naturrecht bei Leonhard Nelson und das Natur­recht der Aufklärung (Dissertation Universität Bern 1924, bei Walther Burckhardt), Berlin- Grunewald: Walther Rothschild, 1924, 139 pp.; Idem: Rechtsphilosophie und Jurisprudenz, Zürich: Girsberger & Co., 1927, 54 pp.; Idem: Recht und Kultur auf dem Grunde der Ethik, Zürich: Girs­ber­ger & Co., 1929, 48 pp.; Idem: Ungeschriebenes Gesetz und Rechts­ordnung – Mit Gedanken zur Rechtsphilosophie von Jakob F. Fries und Leonhard Nelson, in: Festschrift für Fritz von Hippel zum 70. Geburts­tag, ed. Josef Esser and Hans Thieme, Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1967; Idem: Rechtsgedanke und Kultur­gedanke im Ver­hältnis von Gesetzesethik und Wertethik; Idem: Die philoso­phischen Grundlagen der Naturrechtslehre und des Rechtspositivismus, beide in: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969; Idem: Zur rechtstheo­retischen Vermächtnis Walther Burckhardts, in: Zeit­schrift des Bernischen Juristen-Vereins, vol. 107 (1971), pp. 23 ss.; Idem: Bindung und Offenheit des Rechts in rechtsphilosophischer Sicht, in: Homo Creator, Festschrift für Alois Troller, ed. Paul Brügger, Basel: Hel­bing & Lichten­hahn, 1976, pp. 303 ss.

 

 

 

[For Further Reading]

 

Jakob Friedrich Fries: Philosophische Rechtslehre und Kritik aller positiven Gesetzgebung, Jena: Johann Michael Mauke, 1803 (reprint in: Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9: Schriften zur angewandten Philosophie, vol. 1, Aalen: Scientia, 1971);

 

Arnold Gysin: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frank­furt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969;

 

Leonard Nelson: Die Rechtswissenschaft ohne Recht – Kritische Betrachtungen über die Grundlagen des Staats- und Völkerrechts, insbesondere über die Lehre von der Souveränität, Leipzig: Veit & Comp., 1917 (2^nd ed. Göttingen/ Hamburg: Öffentliches Leben, 1949); Idem: Vorlesungen über die Grundlagen der Ethik, Band 3: System der philosophischen Rechtslehre und Politik, Leipzig: Peter Reinhold, 1924;

 

Christoph Westermann: Recht und Ethik bei Fries und Nelson, in: Recht und Ethik – Zum Problem ihrer Beziehung im 19. Jahrhundert (Studien zur Philosophie und Literatur des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, vol. 9), ed. Jürgen Blühdorn and Joachim Ritter, Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1970, pp. 113 ss.

 

 

 

12 November 2017                                                                     Michael Walter Hebeisen

 

The Anthology of Swiss Legal Culture

 

Cluster "Philosophy of Law and General Jurisprudence"

 

2^nd Section "Legal Methodology and Scientific Character of Jurisprudence, or: Contro­versy Between Positivism and Natural Law, Between Monism and Dualism, and the Pluralist Alternative of Human Studies"

 

Entry 2.3b "Arnold Gysin, Philosophische Grundlagen"

 

Selected, Elaborated and Discussed by Michael Walter Hebeisen

 

 

 

Author: Arnold Gysin

 

Title: Die philoso­phischen Grundlagen der Naturrechtslehre und des Rechtspositivismus

 

Edition(s): in: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969, pp. 82 ss.

 

 

 

[Introduction/Historical Situation and Systematic Context]

 

Arnold Gysin intended originally to promote at the University of Berne with a legal philosophical thesis with Eugen Huber; however, the latter delegated him to his younger colleague Walther Burckhardt who remained his mentor until his death (“Die Lehre vom Naturrecht bei Leonhard Nelson und das Natur­recht der Aufklärung”). The interest of Gysin has been directed towards the critique of jurisprudence as it had been addressed by Leonard Nelson, who originated from Low-Saxony and represented a key figure in the domain of German legal thought (please consult his well-known principal writing: Die Rechtswissenschaft ohne Recht – Kritische Betrachtungen über die Grundlagen des Staats- und Völkerrechts, insbesondere über die Lehre von der Souveränität, Leipzig: Veit & Comp., 1917). Nelson principally counts to the Kantian and therefore idealistic current within legal philosophy, however he stands for a third orientation, going back to the Immanuel Kant-scholar Jakob Friedrich Fries. These relations turned out to be very important in order to understand the general attitude of Gysin towards jurisprudence and legal philosophy.

 

Jakob Friedrich Fries (refugeed in Switzerland during the so-called Helvetik period) distinguished apprehension radically from reason, and thereby he criticised the critique of reason and cognition, as it had been established by Immanuel Kant. In the understanding of Fries, reason was not to be considered as lucid and enlightened but as dark, turbid, and partially unconscious. Based on such concrete insights, philosophy has to build a system of metaphysics by reflecting these pieces of conscious reason and to identify principles. Such a critique of reason is grounded in psychological analysis, i.e. the psychological approach is integrated into theoretical philosophy. Generally, reason is only to be considered as conscious, where it is accompanied by concrete application and illustrated by conception or perception. Fries had Carl Gustav Jung among his students at the University of Jena, the grandfather of the psychoanalyst with the very same name; the family Jung had to emigrate to Switzerland, and Jung was asked to reorganise the Faculty of medicine at the University of Basel, recommended by Alexander von Humboldt.

 

The basic conviction of Jakob Friedrich Fries lies in the systematics of legal philosophy. Every philosophical reflection is declared to be natural law in effect and, therefore, a philosophical enlightened jurisprudence equals a critique of positive legal order. Critisism, however, is also addressed to natural law theory, and the general intention consists in founding a renewed natural law theory, in consequence. These thoughts show all um already in the title of the principal writing in case: “Philosophische Rechtslehre und Kritik aller positiven Gesetzgebung, mit Beleuchtung der gewöhnlichen Fehler in der Bearbeitung des Naturrechts” (Jena: Johann Michael Mauke, 1803; reprint in: Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9: Schriften zur angewandten Philosophie, vol. 1, Aalen: Scientia, 1971). This work is highly recommended for further reading...

 

Leonard Nelson has been attracted by the so-called Fries school early in his career and decidedly defended the philosophical character of the practical philosophical applications of the psychological inclined theory of cognition. In constant dispute and controversy with the rich number of Fries scholars, representing the savant intelligence of his time, Nelson proposed an application of the moral philosophy to legal thought. As a communist, converted to a socialist or socio-democratic Nelson established on the basis of this philosophical orientation a profoundly cardinal and categoric criticism of virtually all currents of legal thought. And his critique mainly of positivistic inclinations has been heard and discussed vividly in his time. We do not consider as Nelson’s principal writing his polemic, yet militant “Jurisprudence Without Law”, but rather his extended and comprehensive “System der philosophischen Rechtslehre und Politik” (the 3^rd vol. of: Vorlesungen über die Grundlagen der Ethik, Leipzig: Peter Reinhold, 1924), a book that is recommended for further reading.

 

Let us briefly reconsider the practical philosophical background of this critique that has his foundations in a certain view of ethical and moral claims. This connection and intimate relation are founded in natural law theory, now gently modernised and not practised in the old school manner. The intention is to direct normative claims of all kinds towards a material and value based normative theory that includes the legal order as well as the Kantian moral law (“Sittengesetz” or “Moralgesetz”). Thereby duty-based normative theory is complemented by a novel value-based normative order. This approach, however, does not directly leads to the so-called “materiale Wert-Ethik” by Max Scheler or Nicolai Hartmann, but rather to a revival of natural law theory, which is highly problematic in terms of the heritage of Kantianism as philosophical modernism (and ultimately on a basis of protestant ethics).

 

 

 

[Content, Abstracts/Conclusions, Insights, Evidence]

 

As a complement, we have selected an essay, where Arnold Gysin discusses two essays on natural law theory by Hans Kelsen, published in “Zeitschrift für öffentliches Recht” (vol. 7 (1928), pp. 221 ss.) and in “Zeitschrift für die Theorie des Rechts” (vol. 2 (1928), pp. 71 ss.), entitled “Das Problem des Naturrechts”. “Sie stellen einen bemerkenswerten Versuch dar, die Methode der positiven Jurisprudenz einerseits zu begründen als ein Verfahren wissenschaftlicher Sollenserkenntnis und sie andererseits zugleich aufs strengste zu unterscheiden von der Methode des Naturrechts”. The condensed argumentation of this rereview article cannot be further condensed. The conclusions of Gysin are somewhat irritating, as he considers the attempt by Kelsen with respect to his “Pure Theory of Law” to reassure his own opinions bysed on a modified and modernised natural law theory. “Mit dem Fortschreiten objektiver Erkenntnis muss daher der Dualismus zwischen Naturrecht und Rechtspositivismus verschwinden. Und zwar verschwindet er zu Gunsten eines ‘kritischen Positivismus’. [...] Deshalb kann dieses positivistische Verfahren denn auch nur praktisch begründet werden, genauer: nur als eine technische Notwendigkeit der Praxis, nicht aber als Verfahren der Rechtserkenntnis. Und damit diese Begründung der eigenartigen positivistischen Methode möglich sei, ist die Existenz einer naturrechtlichen Methode Voraussetzung”. In other words, Gysin holds that natural law theory may serve as a legitimate basis of judicial cognition, whereas an immanent consolidation of legal positivism is to be considered as impossible, according to him.

 

These arguments have to be completed by those put forward by Arnold Gysin in two other essays, entitled “Naturrecht und Positivität des Rechts”, and “Rechtsphilosophie und Jurisprudenz”, respectively, that can be considered as a trilogy of fundamental essays (se nos. 2.3a and 1.7), alltogether trying to revitalise natural law theory in order to overcome predomination positivism, however not in a Catholic or Scholastic tradition, but on the basis of modified Kantianism and Fichteanism (whereas in Jakob Friedrich Fries reason is routed in the unconscious, in Johann Gottlieb Fichte critical cognition is founded in self-consciousness).

 

 

 

[Further Information About the Author]

 

Arnold Gysin, born 29 August 1897 in Basel, died 13 October 1980 in Lucerne, obtained his doctorate in 1923 at the University of Berne, before practicing as a lawyer in Zurich and Lucerne. From 1924 to 1934 he was a private lecturer at the University of Basel. Between 1952 and 1968 he was a federal judge at the insurance court, in the years 1960 and 1961 its president.

 

 

 

[Selected Works of the Same Author]

 

Arnold Gysin: Die Lehre vom Naturrecht bei Leonhard Nelson und das Natur­recht der Aufklärung (Dissertation Universität Bern 1924, bei Walther Burckhardt), Berlin- Grunewald: Walther Rothschild, 1924, 139 pp.; Idem: Rechtsphilosophie und Jurisprudenz, Zürich: Girsberger & Co., 1927, 54 pp.; Idem: Recht und Kultur auf dem Grunde der Ethik, Zürich: Girs­ber­ger & Co., 1929, 48 pp.; Idem: Ungeschriebenes Gesetz und Rechts­ordnung – Mit Gedanken zur Rechtsphilosophie von Jakob F. Fries und Leonhard Nelson, in: Festschrift für Fritz von Hippel zum 70. Geburts­tag, ed. Josef Esser and Hans Thieme, Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1967; Idem: Rechtsgedanke und Kultur­gedanke im Ver­hältnis von Gesetzesethik und Wertethik; Idem: Die philoso­phischen Grundlagen der Naturrechtslehre und des Rechtspositivismus, beide in: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969; Idem: Zur rechtstheo­retischen Vermächtnis Walther Burckhardts, in: Zeit­schrift des Bernischen Juristen-Vereins, vol. 107 (1971), pp. 23 ss.; Idem: Bindung und Offenheit des Rechts in rechtsphilosophischer Sicht, in: Homo Creator, Festschrift für Alois Troller, ed. Paul Brügger, Basel: Hel­bing & Lichten­hahn, 1976, pp. 303 ss.

 

 

 

[For Further Reading]

 

Jakob Friedrich Fries: Philosophische Rechtslehre und Kritik aller positiven Gesetzgebung, Jena: Johann Michael Mauke, 1803 (reprint in: Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9: Schriften zur angewandten Philosophie, vol. 1, Aalen: Scientia, 1971);

 

Arnold Gysin: Rechts­philosophie und Grundlagen des Privat­rechts – Begegnung mit gros­sen Juristen (Juristische Abhandlungen, vol. 9), Frank­furt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1969;

 

Leonard Nelson: Die Rechtswissenschaft ohne Recht – Kritische Betrachtungen über die Grundlagen des Staats- und Völkerrechts, insbesondere über die Lehre von der Souveränität, Leipzig: Veit & Comp., 1917 (2^nd ed. Göttingen/ Hamburg: Öffentliches Leben, 1949); Idem: Vorlesungen über die Grundlagen der Ethik, Band 3: System der philosophischen Rechtslehre und Politik, Leipzig: Peter Reinhold, 1924.

 

 

 

12 November 2017                                                                     Michael Walter Hebeisen