George P. Fletcher is Cardozo professor of jurisprudence at Columbia Law School
“Perpetrators of violent acts rarely concede that they are aggression pure and simple, rather than actions in defense of life, liberty, or some other important value. Is there a sensible boundary between sense and nonsense in claiming self-defense? Lawyers must seek this distinction, for if we surrender to the rhetorical claims of statesmen and paranoids, the line between aggression and self-defense will disappear.”
