Philosopher John Rawls calls it “overlapping consensus.” What I understand the author of A Theory of Justice to mean here is that even among the most embattled opponents, there can be agreement on certain fundamental issues.Of course, even Taliban clerics can concur with militant feminists that rape and armed robbery are public evils. What gets much tougher is finding overlapping consensus on other basics — such as social equality — in a hugely diverse population such as ours. Attaining this overlapping consensus is an object of Rawls’ ideal — the Well-Ordered Society.