2016 Voter's Guide: Can We Legislate Morality?

     Whenever government debates a social issue, there is always the objection proposed that you can't legislate morality.  If by that, it is meant that you can't make a person or society do the right thing, I agree.  The schoolboy forced to sit in his chair will always exclaim, "But I'm standing up on the inside."
     In another sense, every law is an attempt to legislate morality.  If I pass a law about red lights, I am saying that for the good of all involved, I need to curb my right to drive how I please.  It becomes immoral to run the red light and endanger others.  I pay taxes because I have a moral responsibility to provide for a government that can allow us to live trustfully near our neighbor.  To refuse to pay taxes is a moral concern.  When I propose an increase in property taxes, I am saying it is morally right to take more money from the private property of my neighbor to meet my concern.  Do you see how every law has moral implications?
     It is to a government's benefit to write laws that are in keeping with an objective morality.  A law against abortion is a law that regards human life as sacred.  People learn to respect other life as well, including the disabled and the aged.  It is in society's interest to write laws that uphold morality.
     A generation or two of relativism has left us in a moral shambles.  Pluralism has added the attitude that you have no right to impose your morality on me.  As a result, government is impotent to address any moral concern that is not politically correct- which is to say, any moral concern supported by the spirit of the age.  That said, those candidates who adhere courageously to an objective morality deserve our vote this fall.  They are the salt preserving our culture.