The Limits of Legislating Morality

Yes, it is acceptable to legislate morality. But simply passing a law is not the end of the story.

What do the War on Drugs, the Eighteenth Amendment and abortion practices prior to Roe v. Wade have in common? They’re all evidence — supposedly conclusive — that every time the government tries to “legislate morality,” it fails.

The argument over whether the government should involve itself in regulating individuals’ moral behavior is unusual in that supporters of either side of the argument span both sides of the political aisle. The three examples mentioned above are more often deployed by libertarians or those on the left, but even the more traditional right is prone to adopting such a stance at times.

Justifying his opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Senator Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.) claimed that, despite his personal opposition to racial segregation, “you can’t legislate morality,” and thus that he would oppose the bill. More recently, opponents of lesbian and gay Americans’ civil rights have condemned governmental moves to protect their access to basic goods and services as unruly attempts to implement new morals by law.

Nothing obscures political dialogue in quite the same way that a vague truism does, and the debate surrounding legislating morality is no exception. While it is so often used in the defense of socially progressive causes, the maxim against legislating morality is sufficiently vague that it can be used to oppose virtually all government action.