Fidelity to law: how Bram Fischer illuminates a perennial debate

ABSTRACT This is the text of the 2016 Bram Fischer Memorial Lecture, delivered at Rhodes House, Oxford, on 27 October 2016. These Memorial Lectures honour Bram Fischer QC, a South African lawyer who defended Nelson Mandela and other leaders of the liberation movement when on trial for their lives, and who himself died in imprisonment in 1975. The 2016 Lecture discusses the themes of the famous Hart–Fuller debate and considers them in light of Bram Fischer’s life, in particular his membership of the Communist Party, his estreatment of bail, and his opposition to his consequent disbarring. The Lecture is reproduced here with the kind permission of its organisers, Lord Joel Joffe and Prof Nic Cheeseman, and appears as it was delivered, with only minor editorial changes.