Pubdate: Wed, 27 Sep 2006 Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution (GA) 0927gwxwes.html Copyright: 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Contact: http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/letters/sendletter.html Website: http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/28 Author: Wes Alexander Note: Parentheses in first paragraph indicate italicized intro to the opinion. INCONSISTENT MORALITY IS PROBLEM IN DRUG LAWS (Gwinnett Opinions recently published readers' comments about the effects of the illegal drug trade in Gwinnett County. Here, a Gwinnett resident discusses the pitfalls of society's approach to combatting drug abuse and the inconsistencies of legislation controlling how people must treat their bodies.) The war on drugs is destructive of civil society. Most social and economic problems are related to the inconsistent application of moral principles in our laws and government institutions. Frederic Bastiat [a French economist and politician who lived in the 1800s] said: "When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law." Consider the principle of nonaggression. Aggression is the initiation, or threat of initiation, of physical violence against the person or property of anyone else. Every 4-year-old attending preschool gets basic instruction in recognizing and defending against aggressive behavior. They are taught that it is wrong to use violence against another person or their property except in defense of life and property. Nonaggression is a long-standing constant moral principle that does not change year in, year out. It is universally recognized as just, because it applies equally to everybody. Think about political laws that pertain to our bodies. Who controls our bodies? Do we control them or does the state decide what we may or may not do with our bodies? Is there ever a time or situation when aggression is appropriate to override what we want to do with our bodies? Our political leaders think so. Consider the following: You are restricted from purchasing nontraditional health care. You are restricted from putting things into your body such as so-called illegal drugs from Mexico or Canada whether they are pharmaceutical or recreational. You are restricted from taking things out of your body such as an unwanted fetus. You are restricted from consuming alcoholic beverages on some days and at some times. You are restricted from selling your body's labor below a minimum wage. You are restricted from selling your body's labor beyond a fixed number of hours without penalty to your employer. In times of forced military conscription, young men better not have declined to fight and possibly die in a foreign war. Did you notice that some of these restrictions come from the left and others from the right? Both sides want to control our bodies based on their version of morality. Both sides are wrong because they support law that does not stand on consistent principles. The moral and just position (the nonaggression principle), is "your body belongs to you." Take an honest look at what is happening around you and see if you think our society has retained its moral sense and respect for the law. We live in a society that has lost sight of moral principles. If you look closely, you will see a society that has twisted the golden rule with Machiavellian logic that says "do unto others before they get a chance to do unto you." Peewees to pros, people considered "good sports" bend the rules to win at all cost. Our society and most of its institutions stand on immoral principles. Consider these: All's fair in love and war; the end justifies any means; might makes right. These immoralities are a recipe for chaos. We are witnessing the very real effects of long-term voting for the lesser of two evils. We should not be surprised with the result. Here's how [economist and philosopher] Hans-Hermann Hoppe describes it. "Every detail of private life, property, trade, and contract is regulated by ever-higher mountains of paper laws. Yet the only task that government was ever supposed to assume -- of protecting our life and property -- it does not perform. "To the contrary, the higher the expenditures on social, public, and national security have risen, the more our private property rights have been eroded, the more our property has been expropriated, confiscated, destroyed, and depreciated. The more paper laws have been produced, the more legal uncertainty and moral hazard has been created, and lawlessness has displaced law and order. * Wes Alexander lives in Lilburn. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman