I Apologize to My Fellow Americans

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-31-2017, 12:56 AM)taramarie Wrote: Mikebert is right. It is the law and always has been and there are some very good reasons why it is the law.

Lots of truth in the above.  The law often broadly protects the people and provides a structure for living.  A lot of thought goes into it.

But the law is also often a tool to benefit the ruling elite.  We all know the Golden Rule?  Those with the gold make the rules?  Sometimes, in a crisis period, the new elites are out to reduce the power of the old elites by striking down the laws that favor the old elites.  This can be a good thing, but you have to watch for new laws that favor the new elites.  The old Black Republicans did well in striking down the laws that enabled slavery, but many of them soon became the Gilded Age robber barons, putting laws favorable to themselves in place.

In abstract, I can sympathize with the libertarian desire for smaller, simpler, cleaner legal systems.  On the other hand, the law can be a primary tool for keeping the elites in check.  I disagree with the notion that the fewer the laws, the better off we are.

But, certainly, discussion can be improved by awareness of the law.  For years I've been saying if one provides goods and services to the public, one cannot discriminate, but churches, homes and private clubs are exceptions.  Those unaware of the law argued, until I posted parts of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  I had it pretty much right.  This doesn't mean libertarians can't rationally disagree with the law as it is.  I can respect many of their motivations.  I suspect most any political faction will want to trim the law in one way or another.  Discussing which way or another is a lot of what we do here.

But, yes, no right is unlimited.  One hasn't the right to tread on the rights of others.  When one is promoting imaginary rights such as freedom of association to justify prejudice and discrimination, one should expect the law will get in the way.

Anyway, I feel like posting the opening paragraph of Thoreau's Civil Disobedience.  The principles have some merit.  However, they reflect the old notion that the state shall wither away, and that anarchy is utopian.  Thoreau's stateless utopia would no more work than Marx's.  However, it can sound alluring.

Quote:I HEARTILY ACCEPT the motto, — "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe, — "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. The standing army is only an arm of the standing government. The government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it. Witness the present Mexican war, the work of comparatively a few individuals using the standing government as their tool; for, in the outset, the people would not have consented to this measure.

Of course, Civil Disobedience goes on to say that if one's government is acting immorally, it is immoral to obey. If one is dubious about the state fading away to nothing, one should still be aware of the other messages in Civil Disobedience.