Morals and Laws

"You can't legislate morality."

There's some truth to this saying, but it often leads to the wrong conclusion that morals and laws shouldn't mix. The reality is, they can't be separated.

Law-making is inherently about the question of what is just, and what is just is unavoidably about the question of right and wrong. So you don't get to a law without passing through the realm of morality. In fact, if you remove their moral basis, laws merely become the tyranny of the majority, incapable of being challenged on any other grounds.

So does this mean we should rush to our legislatures and pass all morals into law? Hardly. The sphere of morality is broad, while the role of goverment is limited. Governments are established not to regulate the good of individuals, but to protect and promote the common good. Protecting the common good means establishing outer boundaries within which civilized society can take place, and beyond which society has been so injured as to warrant public interference (e.g. murder and theft). Promoting the common good means establishing those initiatives which foster mutual benefit in a society (e.g. roads and historical preservation).

So when dealing with laws, the question isn't so much whether morals can be legislated, but what morals can be justly legislated.