Natural law is also called the law of “nature’, “reason” or “nature and reason”. Lord Mansfield once called it “principles of law, justice and humanity”. Blackstone acknowledged natural law’s immutability. Dr Johnson saw its rationality. Its modern credentials lie in Lord Radcliffe’s 1960 call never to lose touch with natural law or give up the belief that all positive law bears some relation to it. Lon Fuller saw in every school of natural law a coalescence between what the law is and what it ought to be. Hans Kelsen, although a legal positivist, saw the natural law beliefs underlying America’s Constitution. In 1825, with natural law at the forefront, the United States Supreme called slavery an institution of positive law against natural law. But in 1927, with natural law driven into solitary dissent, forced sterilization was approved by that court. Cicero spoke of right reason in harmony with nature, universal unchanging and everlasting. Pufendorf considered natural law essential to a good and peaceful society. Bao Gong saw social harmony’s need for something higher than positive law. Aquinas in the 13th century and Gustav Radbruch in 1945 addressed the dire consequences of ignoring natural law. This law, the Doctor told the Student, is written in our hearts, teaching what is to be done and what is to be fled. Under an unwritten constitution, serious legislative departure from natural law might lead to judicial revisiting of absolute parliamentary supremacy. Independent judicial stewardship of entrenched freedom and rights-friendly constitutions secure natural law-based human rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights flowed from the belief that world peace is best secured by respecting human rights worldwide. Natural law was, as Judge Tanaka said, before, and independent of, the State. Long before, Coke said. Francis Bacon spoke of what is “corroborated and confirmed by law, but is the work of the law of nature”. Natural law ideas exist among common lawyers, civilians, canonists and scholars of Islamic law. International law is, as Emmerich de Vattel said, the law of nature applied to States. Natural law and international law unite against the subjugation of one people by another. Professor Martin S Flaherty said that customary international law may prove more important than treaties to human rights protection. “The common law, now so called, is founded on the law of nature and reason”, Mr Justice Aston said. Throughout common law and equity, there exists a substratum of natural law. We see that in, for instance, commercial law and tort. Administering criminal justice with mercy is natural law. Natural law is a perspective from which pandemic lockdowns are viewed. We can, and should, integrate natural law and positive law. Modern judges have a role in making human law conform to natural law.

Lecture on “Natural Law Now” cum Book Signing for Crocodylus Curiae by Mr. Justice Kemal Bokhary GBM
Lecture on “Natural Law Now” cum Book Signing for Crocodylus Curiae by Mr. Justice Kemal Bokhary GBM
Cases
- Sharington v Strotton (1564) 1Plowden 298
- Calvin’s Case (1607) 7 Co Rep 1
- Dr Bonham’s Case (1610) 8 Co Rep 11
- Sir William Elvis Knight v Archbishop of York (1619) Hob 315
- Fisher v Prince (1762) 3 Burr 1363
- Millar v Taylor (1769) 4 Burr 2302
- Hamilton v Davis (1771) 5 Burr 2723
- Trial of the Earl of Thanet (1799) 20 State Trials 821
- The King v The Inhabitants of Eastbourne (1803) 4 East 103
- Terrett v Taylor 13 US 43 (1815)
- The Antelope 23 US 66 (1825)
- Ogden v Saunders 25 US 213 (1827)
- The Maharaj Libel Case (1862) Bombay Gazette Press 1
- Buck v Bell 274 US 200 (1927)
- South West Africa Case (Ethiopia v South Africa) (Second Phase) (1966) ICJ Rep 6
- Lau Wai Wo (2003) 6 HKCFAR 624
- Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (2004) ICJ Rep 136
Books
- Cicero: Republic
- Marcus Aurelius: Meditations
- T Aquinas: Treatise on Natural Law: Summa Theologica, Questions 90-97 (Henry Regnery Co, 1969)
- Christopher St Germain: Dialogues between a Doctor of Divinity and a Student of the Laws of England (1582) (William Muchall revision published by Robin Clarke & Co, 1874)
- Francisco Suarez: Tractatus de Legibus ac Deo Legislatore (Diogo Gomes de Loureiro, 1612)
- Francisco de Vitoria: Des Indis (Ernest Nys ed) (Oceana Publications, 1964 reprint)
- Works of Francis Bacon (James Spedding, R L Ellis and D D Heath eds) (Longman & Co, 1857-74)
- Viscount Stair: Divine Perfections (Brabazon Aylmer, 1695)
- The Works of John Locke in Ten Volumes, 13th edition, (W Orridge & Son, 1812)
- Samuel Pufendorf: On the Duty of Man and Citizen According to Natural Law (edited by James Tully and translated by Michael Siverthorne) (Cambridge University Press, 1991)
- Emmerlich de Vattel: The Law of Nations; or Principles of the Law of Nature applied to the Conduct and Affairs of Nations and Sovereigns (edited and translated by Joseph Chitty (T & J W Johnson, Booksellers, 1884)
- Blackstone’s Commentaries (Clarendon Press, 1765)
- Robert Richard Pearce: A History of the Inns of Court and Chancery (Richard Bentley, 1848)
- Table-Talk of John Selden 3rd ed (S W Singer ed) (John Russell Smith, 1860)
- J E G de Montmorency: The Natural History of the Law (Humphrey Milford/Oxford University Press, 1921)
- Frederick Pollock: Essays in the Law (Macmillan & Co, 1922)
- Lord Parmoor: A Retrospect (William Heinemann, 1936)
- Lon L Fuller: The Law in Quest of Itself (Beacon Press, 1940)
- Hans Kelsen: General Theory of Law and the State (translated by Anders Wedberg) (Harvard University Press, 1945)
- Robert Gore-Browne: Chancellor Thurlow (Hamish Hamilton, 1953)
- William O Douglas: An Almanac of Liberty (Doubleday, 1954)
- J N D Anderson: Islamic Law in the Modern World (New York University Press, 1959)
- Lord Radcliffe: The Law and its Compass: Not in Feather Beds (Northwestern university Press, 1960)
- Majid Khadduri: Islamic Jurisprudence: Shaf,i’s Risala (John Hopkins University Press, 1961)
- P S Atiyah: Pragmatism and Theory in English Law (Stevens & Sons, 1987)
- J G Merrills: The Development of International Law by the European Court of Human Rights (Manchester University Press, 1993)
- John Humphrey: International Human Rights, 3rd edition (R B Lillich and H Hammun eds) (Aspen Publishers, 1995)
- Richard Rudgley: Lost Civilisations of the Stone Age (Arrow Books, 1998)
- Wilt L Idema: Judge Bao and the Rule of Law (World Scientific Publishing, 2010)
- Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead: Let Equity Prevail (D & M Heritage Press, 2015)
- C L Lim, “Judicial Rhetoric of a Liberal Policy in Hong Kong 1997-2012” at pp117-133 of Towering Judges (Rehan Abeyratne and Iddo Porat eds) (Cambridge University Press, 2021)
- Joseph Drew: Natural Law and Government: After the Covid-19 Revolution (Springer, 2022)
Articles
- Karl Llewellyn, “One ‘Realist’s’ View of Natural Law for Judges” (1939) 15 Notre Dame Law Review 3
- Friedrich Kessler, “Natural Law, Justice and Democracy” (1944) 19 Tulane Law Review 32
- John E McAniff, “The Natural Law – its Nature, Scope and Sanction” (1953) 22 Fordham Law Review 246
- David C Bayne, “Natural Law for Lawyers” (1956) 5 DePaul Law Review 159
- Lord Denning, “Right Standards of Conduct” (1957) Law Society Gazette 159
- M B Crowe, “An Eccentric Seventeenth Century Witness to the Natural Law”, (1967) Natural Law Forum, Paper 129
- Mathew O Tobriner, “St Thomas More and Natural Law” (1978) 12 Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review 1
- Lord Cooke of Thorndon, “Fundamentals” [1988] New Zealand Law Journal 154
- Lord Woolf, “Droit Public – English Style” [1995] Public Law 57
- Sir John Laws, “Law and Democracy” [1995] Public Law 72
- Martin S Flaherty, “Aim Globally” (2000) Constitutional Commentary 205
- Stephen Hall, “The Persistent Spectre” (2001) 12 European Journal of International Law 269
- Lord Donaldson in Hansard, HL (8 December 2004) at p 746
- “Five Minutes of Legal Philosophy (1945) Gustav Radbruch” (translated by Bonnie Litschewski Paulson and Stanley L Paulson) (2006) 26 Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 13
- “Statutory Lawlessness and Supra-Statutory Law (1946) Gustav Radbruch” (translated by Bonnie Litschewski Paulson and Stanley L Paulson) (2006) 26 Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 1
- Victoria Nourse, “Buck v Bell: A Constitutional Tragedy from a Lost World” (2011) 39 Pepperdine Law Review 101
- Eric C Ip, “The Natural Law Ethics of Public Health Lockdowns” (2022) 36 Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics and Public Policy 101
- Note “Justice Breyer: The Court’s Last Natural Lawyer?” (2023) 136 Harvard Law Review 1368
- Candace Terman, “Judgments of Nature” (2024) 8 Review of Politics 152
About the Speaker:
The Honorable Mr. Justice Syed Kemal Shah Bokhary, GBM
Register here to attend the lecture on or before 14 September 2026, 5:00 pm (HKT).
*CPD credits are available upon application and subject to accreditation by the Law Society of Hong Kong (currently pending).
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