Common law judging : subjectivity impartiality and the making of law Are judges supposed to be objective Citizens scholars and legal professionals commonly assume that subjectivity and objectivity are opposites with the corollary that subjectivity is a vice and objectivity is a virtue. These assumptions underlie passionate debates over adherence to original intent and judicial activism. Douglas Edlin challenges these widely held assumptions by reorienting the entire discussion. Rather than analyze judging in terms of objectivity and truth he argues that we should instead approach the role of a judges individual perspective in terms of intersubjectivity and validity. Drawing upon Kantian aesthetic theory as well as case law legal theory and constitutional theory Edlin develops a new conceptual framework for the respective roles of the individual judge and of the judiciary as an institution as well as the relationship between them as integral parts of the broader legal and political community