The phrase "an underlying premise" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used when discussing the foundational idea or assumption that supports a theory, argument, or concept.
Example: "The author's argument is built on an underlying premise that all humans are inherently rational beings."
Alternatives: "a fundamental assumption" or "a basic principle".
There is an underlying premise in Ann Althouse's plea for traditional law school instruction (" 'A Skull Full of Mush,' " column, Feb. 20), and that is that law school graduates, drilled in the case method, will leave knowing "how to think like lawyers".
While the group is open to all possible fixes, including legislative action, an underlying premise of its mission is that the problem cannot be fixed through any single mechanism, and will depend largely on voluntary compliance and initiatives by private companies in the financial and information technology industries, working with law enforcement.
Great startups often come from challenging an underlying premise about how the world operates.
While debates everywhere have it as an underlying premise that being a fellow citizen means being a fellow national, regulation of access to citizenship varies considerably across Western democracies.
Previous human somatotopy studies using fMRI have been limited not only by scanning resolution [2], [4] but by an underlying premise that fMRI reveals discrete activation "hotspots" in response to cutaneous stimulation [3], [5], like those measured electrophysiologically as the firing output of cells.
Although not always recognized, giving higher priority to generalized services remains an underlying premise for good interventions.
At the end of the day, the three lessons of Obama's win center around a single, underlying premise: that America is better off united.
It's also wrong that all too often the underlying premise behind a private equity investment in a particular company is that after it's been milked once, the company will simply be sold onward to another PE fund for further milking -- and further fees payments.
When citizens and elected officials alike vocally oppose a so-called public option, the underlying premise is that this remains an affair for the marketplace, not the realm of politics.
Constitutional America was clearly imperfect, but the underlying premise spoke of a striving toward an ideal.
The number of equations available in statics is limited because of a neglect of the deformations of loaded bodies, a direct consequence of the underlying premise that any solid body under consideration is ideally rigid and immutable as to shape and size under all conditions.
