legalism

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun Overly strict or rigid adherence to the law or to a religious or moral code.
• noun A legal term or expression, especially one that is unnecessarily technical.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun Strict adherence to law or prescription; belief in the efficacy of adhering strictly to the require ments of the law.
• noun Specifically In theology, the doctrine that salvation depends on strict observance of the law, as distinguished from the doctrine of salvation through grace; also, the tendency to observe with great strictness the letter of religious law, rather than its spirit.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• noun Strictness, or the doctrine of strictness, in conforming to law.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun A philosophy of focusing on the text of written law to the exclusion of the intent of law, elevating strict adherence to law over justice, mercy, grace and common sense.
• noun A legal axiom; a statement couched as a proverb expressing a rule of law.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun strict conformity to the letter of the law rather than its spirit