December 2009 LSAT Section 1 Question 12

Editorial: To qualify as an effective law, as opposed to merely an impressive declaration, a command must be backed ...

knoxygirl on May 28, 2017

Could we review?

I assumed B over The correct answer because of the ONLY in that answer choice. That would have guaranteed the conclusion, which felt sufficient, rather than necessary. Could we go over this question, please?

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Mehran on June 7, 2017

@knoxygirl this is Strengthen with Necessary Premise question.

The conclusion here is, "Hence, what is called 'international law' is not effective law."

The support provided?

"To qualify as an effective law, as opposed to merely an impressive declaration, a command must be backed up by an effective enforcement mechanism. That is why societies have police. The power of the police to enforce a society's laws makes those laws effective. But there is currently no international police force."

(E) clearly strengthens the argument. "Only" introduces necessary so (E) would be diagrammed:

EEIL ==> IPF

The negation of (E) is:

"Something other than an international police force could effectively enforce international law."

Remember, to negate an S & N statement you want to show that sufficient can exist without the necessary condition, i.e. EEIL ==> not IPF

This would destroy the conclusion that international law is not effective law based on the premises that there is currently no international police force and to qualify as an effective law, the command must be backed up by an effective enforcement mechanism (i.e. there could be some other effective enforcement mechanism for international law).

Hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.