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Legal syllogism is a legal concept concerning the law and its application, specifically a form of argument based on deductive reasoning and seeking to establish whether a specified act is lawful.[1]
A syllogism is a form of logical reasoning that hinges on a question, a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion. If properly plead, every legal action seeking redress of a wrong or enforcement of a right is "a syllogism of which the major premise is the proposition of law involved, the minor premise is the proposition of fact, and the judgment the conclusion."[2][3] More broadly, many sources suggest that every good legal argument is cast in the form of a syllogism.[3][4][5]
Fundamentally, the syllogism may be reduced to a three step process: 1. "law finding", 2. "fact finding", and 3."law applying." See Holding (law). That protocol presupposes someone has done "law making" already.[3] This model is sufficiently broad so that it may be applied in many different nations and legal systems.[3]
In legal theoretic literature, legal syllogism is controversial. It is treated as equivalent to an “interpretational decision.”[6]
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