The other day I somehow started thinking about various quirks in a private legal framework, and (unfortunately perhaps for you, dear reader) this is really the only place I could think to describe them...
(1) When someone like Rothbard deduces the nature of fines for certain torts, does he ever spell out what happens when there are multiple offenders? E.g. if Smith goes out and shoots Jones to death, maybe the private courts rule that Smith owes Jones’ estate $1 million. But if Smith and his brother go and both shoot Jones to death, do they each owe $500,000 or $1 million? Or do we need more information?
(2) Suppose a husband slips poison into his wife’s drink. After she quaffs it, she goes outside to walk the dog and is hit by a drunk driver. Are both the husband and drunk driver guilty under libertarian law? (Incidentally, I think my proposals for private law can handle weird cases much better than the Rothbardian a priori approach. [See Section IV.] But that’s perhaps a different issue.)
