Law is the tool you turn to when society doesn’t work. It should be the last resort, not the first response.
Do you agree?
In my humble ponderings, every law is a blanket, laid over an entire human situation, applying the same stringent repair to that section of the social herd.
The hope is that the individuals who suffer under a given legal dictate will be fewer in number than those helped. The few individuals who might achieve remedy from some illegal substance will be far fewer than the enormous number of addicts enabled by allowing that substance to be freely marketed. And often this appears to prove true.
Law, by its innate definition, limits human freedom. Legal compliance mandates a confinement of the free flow of human behavior. And when this keeps the gun-pointing intruder or the pen-wielding con artist from attacking our community, such confinement holds obvious advantage. Yet when any solution by its very nature amalgamates the individual into the human herd, and encroaches on people’s precious freedom, must it not be one applied with some reluctance and careful monitoring?
One of the prices we pay for governing ourselves via a representative democracy is the creation of a system which rewards legislators for the sheer number of laws they create. After all, lawmakers are in the business of churning out laws. It is the sole fixit tool they hold in their social repair kit. Everyone wants to elect and praise that Congressperson who creates constant legal action. But perhaps with law’s immense power to crush as well as create, might we seek alternative methods of reforming our society and bringing a little better life for us all?
Just a thought,
– Bart Jackson
