Laws are Moral Decisions

It is often said, when discussing certain social issues, that we cannot legislate morals. Do you know the right response to that question?

In a word, garbage. There is a better word, to be sure, but decorum will not allow its use here.

We can and we must legislate morals. Further, every decision ever made by every legislature, parliament, congress, diet, knesset, or whatever else you want to call it, was an action predicated on a moral decision. Making us drive on the right side of the street is based on the moral axiom that we require order. Forcing parents to send their kids to school, let alone feed and clothe them, is a moral choice that parents are obliged to do that for their progeny. Trying to force health care down our throats is a moral decision by the government. Every single thing a government might do is based on moral choices.

We can and we must legislate morals. We do it all the time. The only real questions are which ones, and under what circumstances. But it's high time time to get off the table the idea that governments cannot legislate morals. They do it every single day. That's why it is so very important that the moral judgments they make are right and necessary and not arbitrary or capricious.