Hart explored the notion of law in simple command and habitual habits, attempting to explain whether all laws may be correctly understood as coercive mandates. According to Hart, there is no logically required link between law and compulsion. He further emphasizes that seeing all laws as coercive commands imposes a false impression of uniformity on various types of laws and the many social purposes that laws may serve. He contends that referring to all laws as coercive commands mischaracterizes their purpose and function, as well as their substance, manner of genesis, and area of application.

Hart attacks John Austin's notion of law, which maintains that all laws are commands of a legally limitless sovereign in The Province of Jurisprudence Determined. According to Hart, laws vary from sovereign mandates in that they may apply to those who enact them rather than only to others. Laws may also differ from coercive commands in that they may bestow powers or privileges rather than imposing responsibilities or obligations.

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Hart began his analysis of Austin's theory of command by referring to the gunman incident to address the question of how imperative orders may be separated between 'ordering' and 'issuing an order,' and how they can be utilised as the foundation of law. According to Hart, Austin failed to differentiate between being "obligated" to do something by a threat and "having a responsibility" to do it.

According to Hart, the position of a person with legal duties differs from the position of someone confronted with a gunman, but Austin runs the two together. Hart suggested rules as a source of duty in place of Austin's idea that legal duties consist of threats of punishment. The concept is straightforward: a rule specifies what you must do.

According to Hart, Command isn't always an order. It cannot be used merely to define what law is. Hart identifies the flaws in Austin's argument and asserts that we must derive the meaning of law from it, rather than limiting ourselves to command as a law.

Command is a generic term, not an order or an address, as demonstrated by the gunman situation, which is an address backed up by a threat, whereas law is neither an order nor an address since the individuals impacted can be left to figure things out on their own. It's generic, and if we mistake it for an address, we'll get mixed up about who it's addressed to and who it's published to.

It is not required for the public officers of the people who are governed by the law to be aware of it. If the principal directive is not followed, a public official will generally draw attention to it. Taxation transactions, for example, may be recorded, and if one is unaware of the legal norms governing it, the tax officer may bring his attention to it.

He then stipulates his idea of law after explaining the contingent nature of power and the dangers of depending on it as a source of social control. The rule of law must have a threat to back it up. Superiority over inferiors is required, but Hart contends that this is not why laws are followed. These regulations may be backed up by the fear of penalty, but individuals have a general propensity to follow rules rather than break them. This is the foundation of society that has been implanted in people's brains, and they willingly support the law and want to punish those who violate since they have a general habit of compliance.

Hart muses about the legal system and its complexities, concluding that in a contemporary legal system, there must be independence, territory, and sovereignty, which are not conceivable in a simple system. Hart then moves on to the concept of sovereignty, which is more difficult in the modern world since it takes more than a threat to back it up.

Hart separates the sovreign's or a group of sovreigns' sovereignty into exterior and internal sovereignty. When a majority decides in favour of a sovereign, gives him or her authority, and works as a subordinate, the sovereign is considered domestically superior. For example, if the adjutant parliament did not collaborate with the king, there would be no one legal system in England. Hart defines external sovereignty as the ability to make decisions within a region without the influence of outside forces.

For example, if the USSR had authority over the monarch in England, the monarch would no longer be a sovereign since each law passed would have to be authorized by the USSR. Sovereignty is a veiled notion. Hart expands on the notion of sovereignty rather than rejecting it.

To summarize, a law in a legal system is a general order backed up by a threat to disobey given by a body that is internally superior and outwardly autonomous.

Conclusion
According to Austin, every system of justice necessitates a sovereign who creates the law (origin) while remaining unaffected by it (range), such as the shooter in the bank scenario, who is the exclusive source of instructions and is not subject to other people's requests. Hart believes that this is an erroneous understanding of law, stressing out that laws can have multiple roots and that legislators are routinely held accountable for the legislation they create.

Hart shows that, in contrast to Austin's "command theory," laws have a much broader reach than coercive commands. Laws are frequently helpful, allowing individuals to carry out authoritative activities such as drafting wills or contracts with legal force. Hart claims that 'authority' of command is intimately tied to the 'authority' of law, and because the 'authority' of law is difficult to explain, we should reject the idea of 'command' because it is associated with the same problematic concept.

Hart's answer to this difficulty is to replace the word "command" with the word "order." Hart avoids the difficulty by using terms such as "order reinforced by threats" and "coercive instructions," as well as stipulating the words "obedience" and "obey."