Indeterminacy, Justification and Truth in Constitutional Theory

In this Article, Professor Lipkin continues the debate over the nature of indeterminacy in constitutional theory, arguing that epistemic indeterminacy is most relevant to the law, because epistemic indeterminacy is more closely tied to practical reasoning than is metaphysical indeterminacy. Professor Lipkin further argues that the controversy over metaphysical or epistemic indeterminacy is really a controversy over truth or justification as the primary form of validating constitutional rules. In Professor Lipkin's view, the search for constitutional truth should be abandoned or, at best, should be treated as a trivial result of the best justification. Finally, Professor Lipkin proposes a new constitutional paradigm, integrating a revised version of Rawl's conception of wide reflective equilibrium with a modified account of Kuhn's theory of scientific change that takes into account the distinction between normal and revolutionary adjudication.

Such a paradigm, Professor Lipkin argues, provides an interesting and complete account of constitutional adjudication and change, and therefore is an especially appropriate vehicle to transport constitutional theory into the twenty-first century.