How would a natural law theorist respond to this:?

Question

"Supose an act ... be prohibited by the sovereign under the penalty of death: if I commit this act, and I object to the sentence, that it is contrary to the law of God [or contray to the moral law],...the court will demonstrate the inconclusiveness of my reasoning, by hanging me up..." (Philosophy of Law, Murphy)

Answer 1

The response is likely to be the same without more information about the nature of the crime, the nature of the punishment, and the nature of the procedure used to convict and punish the perpetrator. That is, the sovereign, having the power, will indeed proceed as the sovereign and its court wishes.

Even apart from the "divine right of kings," if you believe that someone must enforce moral rules or there will be anarchy, the sovereign is the logical, and moral, choice.

The "Law of God" changes with the speaker of that law and is no standard for natural law, which in general is said to proceed from some a priori agreed-upon moral proposition or from the nature of man (other species having no say in the determination). So, the question as posed cannot be answered by a natural law theorist except in the most vague way. A Thomist would say that the nature of man is to need an external enforcer (God or the Church would be his most likely choice, but a king or a king's court would also suffice). A Benthamite would probably argue that someone has to enforce the rule, so without knowing enough about the rule to say if it is utilitarian or not, or the enforcement process, the king or the king's court would seem to be necessary.

Answer 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdOeHFbZWi4&mode=related&search=