Does House Bill 5560 go too far?

It is very easy to criticize others when they push for things which you don't happen to agree with. It can be more difficult to speak against the things which your friends and allies may want. It is even harder still to opine against things which are naturally closer to one's own temperament. Still, we find that we must sometimes speak against any and all of these situations. That is, if we are to claim any real objectivity at all.

The Michigan Legislature has passed a bill which would levy fines against those who disrupt Church services. The penalty could go as high as community service hours for repeat offenses. It was sponsored by State Rep. Deb Shaughnessy, a Republican from Charlotte, and was in reaction to the disruption of Church services at a Church in Delta Township.

We sympathize with the situation. Particularly in light of some of the popularly known disruptions of the funerals of soldiers by a radical Christian group, it would be easy to support harsher penalties such as proscribed by the bill, House Bill 5560. Yet we think that Governor Rick Snyder should not sign it. We are inclined to believe that it ought to be vetoed.

Aren't there laws in place to deal with this kind of situation? If Church patrons are pelted with debris, their children verbally assaulted and fire alarms set of at a Church (as happened in Delta Township) and which was the impetus for this Bill, aren't there already legal options in place by which to punish the offenders? Why do we need more?

To help ensure the safety of those who want to practice their religious beliefs, says Rep. Shaughnessy. But don't the laws in place already mean to do that? Further, when people do not respect the existing law, how can we expect them to respect laws which only really replicate what's already on the books?

The trouble with laws such as these are that the only real effect they have is to make one group appear as though superior to others. That's a dangerous idea. It isn't made palatable because it comes from the right rather than the left. Indeed that may actually make it worse, if conservatives are really the ones who think of each individual as an individual in his own right, whose dignity does not exceed but rather is on equal ground with each other person in the eyes of the law.

The attempt to freely attend religious services without recourse must be seen under the law as no different than the attempt to vote, or participate freely in the job and housing markets. Laws which aid these ideas generally are the best laws. Laws which single out, except in very precise context (we know of no attempt to prevent attendance at religious services though a literacy test, for example), any given person expressing any given right will only appear to make those persons somewhat more special than the rest of us. Quite honestly, it has us reflecting back to Animal Farm.

We do believe, indeed we must stress, that rational and regular religious practice is of tremendous and almost incalculable importance to the health of the body politic. Indeed, the right to freedom of religion is philosophically more important than the rights to vote or seek employment or free speech, though they all necessarily dovetail into one other. But strictly in the eyes of human law, they must be viewed more equally, lest we encourage jealousy rather than respect of people of all creeds and nationalities.