Kants Moral Constructivism and his Conception of Legislation Essay

Some hold that Kants inclination of autonomy requires the rejection of moral realism in favor of moral constructivism. However, gossip on a little noticed passage in the Metaphysics of Morals (with the assistance of Kants Lectures and Reflexionen) reveals that the conception of legislation at the core of Kants conception of autonomy represents a decidedly anti-constructivist strand in his moral philosophy. I. Summary the Meaning of Kants Moral ConstructivismA. John RawlsIn A Theory of Justice, although Rawlss method of generating principles of judge from a choice in the Original Position is described as constructive, in the sense of helpful to settle disputes, the idea of constructivism is hardly present. Constructivism, in the sense that interests us here, first plays a major role in Rawlss 1980 Dewey Lectures, Kantian Constructivism in Moral Theory, where Rawls clarifies his own project as a limited programme in political theory, not in moral philosophy in general, a programme h e has also described as something political, not metaphysical. (2) There Rawls proposes a procedure of construction that connects a particular conception of the person with first principles of justice. In his article Themes Rawls emphasizes a equivalent idea in his interpretation of Kant moral philosophy, leading him to speak of what he calls Kants moral constructivism.In Themes Rawls begins with an outline of the CI-Procedure (where CI is an abbreviation for categorical imperative), which he sees as something given or laid out, based on the conception of free and equal persons as reasonable and rational. The procedure specifies the first principles of objurgate and justice, and through the procedure the... ...or of the moral law. KGS IV, 431.(28) Wrde man unter dem Legislator einen autorem legis verstehen, so wrde dieses blo statutarische Gesetze betreffen. Gesetzen aber, die aus der Natur der Sache durch die Vernunft erkannt werden, wenn man denen einen auctorem beilegt, so kan n er nur autor der Verbindlichkeit sein, die im Gesetz enthalten ist. ... unter dem autore eines natrlichen Gesetzes nur der Urheber der Verbindlichkeit nach dem Imperativ des Gesetzes gedacht werden kann...Metaphysik der Sitten Vigilantius, KGS XXVII, 544-45.(29) ...sind nicht imperious Gesetze. Moral Mrongovius II, KGS XXIX, 634.(30) My thanks to Profs. Otfried Hffe, Karl Ameriks, David Solomon, and audiences at the University of Tbingen and the 1998 APA Pacific Division Meetings and my commentator there, Mark LeBar, for helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.