medium · LSAT Reading Comprehension
The doctrine of judicial precedent serves genuinely important values: it lends the law predictability, treats like cases alike, and constrains the discretion of individual judges. Yet the doctrine also entrenches mistaken rulings. In theory, courts can correct an erroneous precedent by overruling it or by 'distinguishing' the case at hand, and legislatures can rewrite the underlying rule. In practice, however, courts overrule sparingly for fear of unsettling expectations, distinguishing breeds convoluted reasoning that muddies the law, and legislative repair stalls for want of political attention. The avenues for correction exist, but they rarely deliver.
Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?
- Although precedent secures valuable stability, the remedies it offers for its own mistakes tend to fail when actually relied upon.
- Predictability is the single most important quality a legal system can possess, outweighing every competing concern.
- The doctrine of judicial precedent is an obsolete institution that inevitably produces injustice and should be discarded.
- Legislatures are markedly better than courts at repairing the legal errors that precedent leaves behind.
- Courts that distinguish cases rather than overruling them do so chiefly to avoid the political backlash of legislative reform.
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