Constraining Judicial Discretion: Moral Reasoning, Democracy, and Judicial Justice

Abstract

Judicial discretion has long been regarded as an indispensable institutional mechanism through which courts respond to the indeterminacy of legal rules and pursue substantive justice. In hard cases, such discretion is frequently exercised through moral reasoning, enabling judges to supplement positive law with normative considerations. Nevertheless, where moral reasoning is deployed erroneously, disproportionately, or without adequate regard to democratic legitimacy and the rule of law, it may give rise to legal conflict and undermine judicial justice. When moral reasoning extends beyond the boundaries of law and produces a structural imbalance between law and morality, constraints on judicial discretion become not only justified but necessary, albeit such constraints must be designed and applied with caution. Against this background, the article traces the intellectual development of judicial discretion and examines its normative expansion within the modern rule-of-law framework. It then analyses the influence of moral reasoning on judicial adjudication, clarifies the jurisprudential relationship between legal reasoning and moral reasoning, and identifies the principal modes through which moral reasoning operates within judicial decision-making. By assessing conflicts between moral reasoning and political principles, the article further elucidates the role of moral reasoning in the pursuit of judicial justice and re-examines the relationship between law and morality. Finally, it addresses the contemporary challenges confronting judicial discretion and explores how moral reasoning may be constrained to promote judicial justice.