ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses several problems that nuclear deterrence poses for action-based deontological moral theories. Nuclear deterrence, however, belies the commonplace claim that all moral theorists generally agree on what is right or wrong, that they merely have different bases for making their judgments. Action-based theorists all too often argue against the system of deterrence in a way that is analogous to the way they think utilitarians must argue against the system of justice. Arguments in moral theory often are grounded in intuitions of rightness and wrongness and of goodness and badness, with actions counting as either right or wrong and outcomes as either good or bad. Action-based moral theories are concerned with what an individual does, with the natures of actions and individuals, with the relationship of actions to character rather than to consequences. As Lon Fuller notes, "Any private and uncommunicated intention of the draftsman of a statute is properly regarded as legally irrelevant to its proper intepretation.".
