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Defending his nomination of former Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, President Obama has studiously avoided the “e-word” that got him into so much trouble in the past: empathy. As a candidate, and then again when he nominated Sonia M...
In October 2008, then-Senator Obama surprised many when he included two works by Adam Smith on a list of the books that most deeply influenced him. The question of whether “The Wealth of Nations” has been an inspiration for Obama’s response...
Smith is an important source for Obama’s conviction that just and impartial judgment must be grounded in a sense of empathy for our fellow human beings. Although the president’s critics have insisted that justice must be blind and that empathy can only bias judicial...
The word “empathy” was coined in the 20th century to describe our ability to feel our way into another’s point of view. Smith called this ability “sympathy.” He saw every instance of sympathy as...
Smith goes on to argue that rules of justice can be generalized from our individual moral sentiments. We conclude that slavery is unjust from the fact that we sympathize not only with the fictional Eliza but with all those who really suffered under slavery. Our society can then be called...