Sometimes laws are made that seem to want to legislate morality. The best example that comes to mind is Prohibition. The US gov’t. made this law and it didn’t work, and I think it’s because no governing body can effectively establish a law that will legislate morality. I’m not sure if I am effectively making my point here, forgive me. What I mean to say is that if a law is made that prohibits a substance or an act that is morally reprehensible but not universally wrong, then how can it be effectively enforced? I find this frustrating because I know the concept I am trying to relate but lack the words to express what it is that I am trying to put forth. Any help?
“And on the eighth day, God Created beer
to prevent the Irish from taking over
the Earth.” ~SNOOGANS~
Well that’s part of my dilemma. Who’s morality indeed. That’s pretty much the crux of the issue, I guess. Is it possible or even desireable for <governing body> to dictate the morality of <governed body>
The constitution provides for freedom of speech and freedom of religion, why not freedom of morality, to decide for oneself what is morally reprehensible and what is not. I concede that there are obvious things that are just inherently not right, but where do you draw the line. That’s just what I’m asking, I guess.
Thanks for the help, Doug!
“And on the eighth day, God Created beer
to prevent the Irish from taking over
the Earth.” ~SNOOGANS~
Excuse me, but isn’t 99.9% of all existing legislation based on moral principles?
Drunk Driving Laws: It’s immoral to drive drunk.
Mandatory Insurance Laws: It’s immoral to make honest people pay higher insurance rates to compensate for those clowns who won’t carry insurance.
FDA Laws: It’s immoral for manufacturers to sell agricultural products that are unsafe.
You get the idea.
I think what the OP is getting at is that there are frequently attempts at legislating activities that are strictly a matter of personal choice; that is, they don’t seem to affect anyone else. Or, if you prefer the term, “victimless crime.”
Marijuana laws come to mind. Also Prohibition. Casino gambling. Heck, some would even say speed limits.
Well, presumably a law that protects the lives of citizens can be argued as based in self-interest, not morality. So the law against murder is not, in this analysis, based on the immorality, but on the self-interest of indivdual members of society. (“By making murder illegal, I create a deterrent so that the liklihood of my murder is decreased.”)
Now - what laws do not lend themselves to that justification?
A good analysis, Bricker, but not one I agree with. The problem, as I see it, is that all laws are based upon the self interest of some segment of the legislative body. Societal self-interest has been used to justify everything from helmet laws to treason. The problem is you might look at prohibition and say it was obviously motivated by morality, while I might say it was motivated by the self-interest of a society weighing the costs of permissiveness and alcoholism.
I really think the answer is more complex and combines your position with rastahomie’s. Laws are not passed for a simple cause, they grow out of a complex web of societal, historical and moral vectors. Often one of these factors may seem the predominate influence, but that does not mean the other factors are absent.
To me, the interesting question is whether or not the government has the mandate or the means to effectively legislate against behavior whose direct consequences are restricted to silling participants.
The best lack all conviction
The worst are full of passionate intensity.
*
Rastahomie, you’re missing a step in there. It’s not immoral, per se, to drive drunk. These laws are created to make sure that harm comes to as few people as possible, which I suppose has to do with morality, but not in the way you’re asserting.
Some states still have laws prohibiting sodomy between consenting adults. That’s legislating morality. Only straight people are allowed to get married. That’s legislating morality. What you cited, though, is simple legislation.
“Buffalo Bills? Oh, yeah. The guys that always snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.” --WallyM7
It’s a bit off topic, but I’d like to question the assertion that there are some things that are ‘universally’ wrong. I have never been able to come up with anything that has always, everywhere, by everyone, been considered to be wrong. I seem to find that everything is relative- a behavior that we find to be wrong by the moral standards of our society may be perfectly fine, even morally admirable, by another. So I would venture to propose that ALL legislation has a moral component to it, and that the failure of such legislation, such as Prohibition, occurs when a minority of the population pushes through a legislation that actually CONFLICTS with the moral standards of the majority. Basically, a few people thought alcohol was morally wrong. A great many more people didn’t think that-they continued to make and drink it, and eventually the law was repealed…
Sure, you can legislate morality. As has ben said, all laws in one way or another speak of h morality o the society that makes the laws.
The issue here is the legislation of personal morality.
And to answer that question, I can only say that if we were a true democracy, we should, but since we are a Constitutional Rebublic, we should not, but the fact is, we do anyway.
In practical terms, we probably can finds things that are universally wrong. While a few sociaopaths believe that it’s okay to kill just for the fun of it, they are in such a small minority thatmost societies would agree that murder (in this definition) is wrong; so many so would agree as to make it “universal” for practical purposes.
I would suggest that many laws aren’t enacted simply or even primarily for “moral” or “ethical” reasons as because they are judged to benefit society. If driving drunk made people better drivers, we wouldn’t have laws against it. If allowing mob justice led to safer streets, we might allow this as well.
Moral in regards to personal morality is probably best understood as trying to legislate acts which do not directly effect those not inolved and to which the participants agree.
Example: at Bucky’s Edwardian mansion, it is okay to spank the maids, because they all agree that it’s a perk of the job. In a normal office, it would be wrong because it inflicts pain on those who don’t merit it. Doing coke before performing an operation is wrong because of the danger to the patient and is therefore made illegal; doing coke at home, while potentially stupid, should not be illegal and attempts to regulate it are attempts to regulate morality.
Good governments, if they value rightsmore than power or order, have no business making laws that regulate morality in that sense.
(Of course, if I were king, I might ban crappy boy groups like Menudo or N’Sinc, because they offend me. But such a kingdom would be, at best, a benevolent dictatorship without much chance of lasting)
Bricker and Spiritus make excellent points by seperating morality and societal self interest. Prohibition has been used here as an example of lesislation of morality at that time.
Remember that at that time a majority of the people who were pushing prohibition had another item on their agenda that also passed…women’s suffrage.
Never mind, I don’t want to post anything that will get me in trouble. But I think I can post an “up to your imagination” example:
Anally raping your ________________ with a ______________while eating the flesh of your ___________ and ________ so that you are better able to ___________, is considered morally reprehenible and downright heinous by ereryone on the planet.
Of course, that’s just WAG, I could be wrong.
“And on the eighth day, God Created beer
to prevent the Irish from taking over
the Earth.” ~SNOOGANS~
Life was more simple when we all lived in little villages and the highest local word about what was right or wrong came from church or synagogue.
Note I said “local” word.
(bolding mine.)
No, let’s leave the motivation out of it-we can’t address that. We’re addressing the action of killing. Our society DOES, on the whole, believe that killing is okay, at least under some circumstances (war, capital punishment, defending yourself/your home/your family, etc). So we cannot say that we believe that killing is a universal wrong.
Rape? Well, at the present our society thinks it’s wrong. But for centuries it has been an accepted and expected behavior for invading soldiers to rape the women of the conquered territory. *Within the society of the soldiers * the act of rape was, therefore, not wrong. And before all the vets jump on me, it was also acceptable for a slaveowner t o do anything he chose with his own slaves, until quite recently it was not possible for a man to rape his wife no matter how willing she wasn’t, etc.
Help me out here. Other opinions?
Cannibalism? Not something we practice today, but there have been (and may still be) ‘primitive’ cultures which did or do consider it acceptable behavior.
Now wouldn’t the old tradition practiced by those who worshiped Baal by sacrificing their first-born child be considered murder by us today? Guess that takes care of the murder being universally & always considered immoral argument.
Kant, of course, is a fairly famous philosopher. He came up with the idea of the categorical imperative, the thing that is at all times right. He felt that that the only imperatives you should follow are categorical ones. He also said that the ultimate good is a good will.
He was trying to found a morality that was based SOLELY on reason, something that is supposedly universal.
Now, I agree that a morality based solely on reason would be great, I only question if it’s possible…
Oh, and I think all legislation is legislation based on morality (after all, SHOULD we pass laws for the good of society as a whole??).
I sold my soul to Satan for a dollar. I got it in the mail.