We Are Becoming Lawless Because of Too Many Laws

 Over 2300 years ago, Plato pointed out that not only are societies that have no laws lawless, but societies in which there are no limits on the laws that a government can establish are also lawless. In other words, a constitution that limits the government from passing arbitrary laws is necessary to prevent a country from degenerating into chaos or tyranny. The purpose of law is to punish behavior that a society considers bad and sometimes to reward good behavior. For law to be effective, citizens need to be able to understand what the law is. That is only possible if the law is relatively simple, slow to change, and any changes that occur are based on principles that are widely known and reasonably predictable. To the extent that laws are many, complex, subject to rapid change, and changes are arbitrary and unpredictable, it becomes more and more difficult to obey the law. What real difference is there between a society that is lawless because there are no laws to obey and a society that is lawless because the laws have become too arbitrary, unpredictable, complicated, and subject to rapid change to obey?

The economy suffers under either kind of lawlessness. Businesses will not invest and will not hire new workers when the future is impossible to predict. I think the fact that laws have become unpredictable is a major reason why the economy of the United States is as bad as it is today. Businesses both large and small are in shock and don't know what the future holds because many things that could not have predicted have happened in a very short period of time. Who could have predicted a couple of years ago that the government would own a controlling interest in two of the three American automobile companies? Who could have predicted that the government would ignore the bankruptcy laws that give bondholders preference when companies go bankrupt, as it did in the bankruptcies of General Motors and Chrysler? Who would want to buy corporate bonds or extend credit to companies when the government treats creditors as if they have no rights? The health care reform bill that may or may not soon be passed by Congress and signed by the President may have a substantial effect on how much it costs to hire a worker and provide health benefits. The cap and trade bill, which also may or not pass, could dramatically affect energy costs. Businesses need to know what their costs are. I predict that if it becomes clear that either the the health care reform bill or the cap and trade bill will not pass, the stock market indices will go up and the unemployment rate will go down, at least temporarily. That much is obvious, but I also predict that the stock market indices will go up and the unemployment rate will go down if either the health care reform bill or the cap and trade bill pass. Businesses may not like bad news, but they can handle it. What they can't handle is uncertainty. They are used to taking calculated risks, but when they can't calculate the risks, then they don't want to take them.

We and the people who represent us in the Congress and in state legislatures make the mistake of thinking of legislators as law makers. That means that they focus only on making new laws, which adds to the complexity of the laws and makes understanding the law almost impossible. They give very little attention to the laws that have already been passed. They need to be thought of not only as makers of new laws but as maintainers of a code of laws. In addition to making new laws, they should be repealing or modifying laws that have outlived their usefulness or never worked to begin with. They need to follow up on laws after they have been passed to see if the actual consequences of the laws match their intent. We need to understand what there role should be and try to encourage them to simplify things instead of making them more complicated. Since this Congress seriously considers passing laws that are over a thousand or two thousand pages long, it is obvious that they have not gotten that message. They need to avoid passing laws that can't be enforced because that promotes disrespect for the law, and they need to realize that the only law that enforces itself is the law of unintended consequences.

Reactivating blog

Much has happened since the last year that convinces me that the United States of America is being transformed into something its founders would not recognize and that its current citizens may not recognize in a couple of decades.  For one thing, the levels of spending and debt are on an unsustainable course, as can been seen by examining the "debt clock at http://usdebtclock.org.  What is really scary is not only the absolute debt, but how much debt there is per person.  The unfunded liabilities are even bigger than the official debt.  They represent the promises (such as for Social Security payments and Medicare coverage) that the government has made to spend money in the future that it has not collected money for.  This course cannot be sustained; something has to give.  I am worried about the future of our children and grandchildren who will be asked to pay for all the spending and borrowing and may not be able to.  I am also worried about the liberties that are being lost that citizens used to be able to take for granted.  There will be more about that in future posts.  What I hope to accomplish with this blog is to stimulate discussion about whether the United States can be saved and, if not, how to pick up the pieces and start again once the house of cards comes crashing down.  I am worried that the Constitution of the United States is losing its effectiveness because all three branches of government have been showing it little respect and because most American citizens are unaware of its contents and its importance.

Although readers of this post are encouraged to comment, the comments will not show up immediately because I have the blog set up so that comments are posted only after I moderate them.  I have set the blog up this way because of a prior experience in which inappropriate material appeared in a comment.  I will not bar a comment because the commenter disagrees with me, but I will bar it if is obscene, disrespectful, or otherwise inappropriate.

It's about time I made another post.

OK, I have not been very good about making it so, at least when it comes to regular posts. The main reason is that my adopted son, who will be two years old in June, takes up so much of my free time, that it is hard to get anything done. I am a bureucrat. One of the primary rules of bureaucrat survival is to find someone to blame who can't defend himself. Sorry about that, Adam.

My older son, Robert, has been much more diligent about posts on his blog - Blog of the Enders. He is running for State Representative for the 80th district of Indiana. Saying anything more would put me in violation of the Hatch Act, which prohibits us bureaucrats from becoming involved in partisan politics. However, I am not forbidden to make me thoughts known, especially with regard to a certain politician who is not eligible to be re-elected. So, let me say that I am in the shrinking minority of people that approve of most of what President Bush has done, although I disagree with some of what he has done. On the big things, he did not lie when he warned of Saddam Hussein having weapons of mass destruction, and I think invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Privatization of Social Security in the only thing that will save it. The only other alternatives are decreasing benefits, raising taxes or both. That is just the way the numbers work. Medicare is a bigger problem, and making it a bigger problem yet by expanding it with prescription drug coverage was the biggest mistake of the Bush presidency. Medicare is doomed, and the aftermath is going to be very, very ugly. Again, its just the way the numbers work.