Why Bother With Laws?

Politicians can break the law; high ranking military officers can break the law, civil servants can break the law, and God only knows how many private citizens not only break the law but do it repeatedly so it begs the question; if nobody is going to obey the laws and are going to go unpunished or only given a slap on the wrists, why bother with any law? And what about our kids? How are we expected to instill the idea of right & wrong or the importance of respecting those that attempt to enforce the laws when we see those very same people breaking those very same laws?!?!

Any law is only as strong as it’s enforcement against those that break it and it can only have real meaning when it is strongly enforced against those that knowingly and wantingly break it. We have categories of how badly a law is broken just like we have different levels of kinds of murder, yet there seems to be some kind of “get out of jail free” card that certain members of our society are able to present and walk away, nearly unscathed while the common man or woman often get the book thrown at them. If indeed “all men are created equal” then why aren’t all laws enforced equally?

Granted, judges and police officers are granted a certainly degree of “discretion”. That is to say that they are allowed to use their own judgement, based upon what they have learned, to alter the decision of whether to arrest, charge, and prosecute as well as in sentencing of prospective law breakers. Is that right? Should they have such an allowance? Over time we have seen plenty of examples of where good judgement can equal good justice, but it isn’t always rendered equally. Some inequalities are based on race, economic disadvantaged, and many other similar practices that smack of some form of discrimination. Sadly, there are probably as many opinions on this as there are examples.

In the past the penalties for law breakers were often based upon both the seriousness of the crime as well as the position of the law breaker. That is to say, the greater your level of responsibility, notoriety, and recognition in society, the harder you could expect to be treated. It was based upon the idea that those people were our hero’s, the folks we pointed to as an example of how our children should strive to be like. Now, it is so hard to find a genuine hero that doesn’t have feet of clay that we should be doubly putative for letting us down.

We wrestle with the differences of right & wrong, truth or fiction, making money or being moral, and so many other apparent challenges. Can’t we find a better way to reward those that are exemplary? To make it so rewarding for doing the right thing that few, if any, will bother trying to cut corners and do the wrong thing. Sadly, I am afraid that ship has sailed and it could be a very long time before we have such an opportunity to gain a foothold, especially in times where greed, fortune, and wealth seem to be paramount in every young persons mind.

It’s simple. It all starts with having a respect for the law and that only occurs when laws are equally enforced across the board; no exceptions. You break the law, you pay the price. Once we have rebuilt a healthy respect for the law, those that keep the law will be more highly revered by our peers as well as our leaders. Our children are great imitators and when they see us abiding by the law, the too will fall in line.