Socrates and Legal Obligation
was first published in 1981. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.
Charged with "impiety" and sentenced to death under the law of Athens, Socrates did not try to disprove the charges or to escape death, but rather held to a different kind of rhetoric, aiming not at persuasion but at truth. In
, R.E. Allen contends that Plato's works on Socrates' acceptance of death—the
Apology
and the
Crito
— should be considered together and as such constitute a profound treatment of law and of obligation to law. Allen's study of Socrates' thought on these vital issues is accompanied by his own translations of the
.