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Equality and Equity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2009

D. Daiches Raphael
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Extract

In some sense every man has a moral right, or more properly a moral claim, to equality with other men. In what sense will, I hope, become apparent in the course of this paper. That there is such a claim in some sense is clear enough. “Equality before the law,” for example, is something which we all recognize to be right.

Type
Articles
Information
Philosophy , Volume 21 , Issue 79 , July 1946 , pp. 118 - 132
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1946

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References

page 118 note 1 “No school was in more deadly opposition to such a priori truths than the school of Bentham and the utilitarians. Yet, Bentham's famous doctrine, that, in calculating happiness each man is to count for one, and nobody for more than one, seems to be simply the old principle in a new disguise.” SirStephen, Leslie, address on “Social Equality” in Social Rights and Duties Vol. I, p. 180Google Scholar.

page 120 note 1 I use the word “obligation” here to mean the same as Sir David Ross's expression “prima facie duty.”

page 121 note 1 Collected Papers, Vol. I, p. 154.

page 121 note 2 P. 131.

page 121 note 3 Address on “Social Equality,” op. cit., p. 177.

page 121 note 4 Op. cit., p. 185.

page 121 note 5 Op. cit., p. 184.

page 122 note 1 Published by the Manchester Statistical Society, 1944.

page 123 note 1 “Morally right” is used here in the sense of “obligatory.” Sometimes the adjective “right” is used so as to mean “not wrong” and so to include both the morally right and the morally neutral.

page 124 note 1 As usually stated, though it can be stated as a claim of special need. Opening the House of Commons Debate on the demobilization plan, Lt.-Col.

page 126 note 1 This does not of course mean that the obligation to help the needy is derived from the principle of equity or that of equality. The point is that discrimination in favour of the needy is justified by equity, and justified as supporting equality not as opposing it.

page 127 note 1 This double claim of the disabled ex-serviceman caused a number of Members of Parliament, when the Disabled Persons (Employment) Bill was considered, to forget that other disabled men also have the special claim of need. The Minister of Labour, Mr. Bevin, resisted attempts to give priority of employment to disabled ex-servicemen only and insisted that all disabled men, from whatever cause their disability arose, should have the priority, though he agreed that if it were impossible to find work for all of them the disabled ex-serviceman would have the stronger claim.

page 130 note 1 Some would say that the principle involved is a moral claim to self-development and not the obligation of beneficence. At any rate it is not the principle of equity.

page 130 note 2 The State does not subsidize scientific research for its own sake. Those who value knowledge for its own sake may provide money for pursuing this end, but subsidies from the public purse have a utilitarian purpose, to benefit the public.