Carl N. Brown
Member
OK, this was constitutional:
This, too, was constitutional:
Constitutional or not does not mean that a law should be passed just because it can be passed.
At the risk of being labelled a member of the "law and economics" school, I would like to point out that there should be a common-sense balance of cost v benefit of any law. It does the dignity of the law no good to pass ludicruous laws just because the legislative branch has the power to do so: the legislature incurs the cost of undermining public respect for Law by passing useless or conterproductive laws laden with unintended consequences.
Since Lott 2000, CDC 2003 and NAS 2004 found no measurable benefit from the anti-gun laws, and they obviously at least divert taxpayer dollars away from policies that are believed to work, there is no cost v benefit balance justifying outlawing pink guns (or "shoulder things that go up").
This re-enforces in my mind that legal, illegal, right and wrong are four different sets with varying intersecting subsets. Just because it is legal does not make it right.
AMENDMENT XVIII.
Section 1. After one year from the ratification of this article
the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors
within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof
from the United States and all territory subject to the
jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.
Section 2. The Congress and the several States shall have
concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate
legislation.
Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have
been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the
legislatures of the several States, as provided in the
Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission
hereof to the States by the Congress.
This, too, was constitutional:
AMENDMENT XXI.
Section 1. The eighteenth article of amendment to the
Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.
Section 2. The transportation or importation into any State,
Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use
therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws
thereof, is hereby prohibited.
Section 3. (repeats boilerplate XVIII above)
Constitutional or not does not mean that a law should be passed just because it can be passed.
At the risk of being labelled a member of the "law and economics" school, I would like to point out that there should be a common-sense balance of cost v benefit of any law. It does the dignity of the law no good to pass ludicruous laws just because the legislative branch has the power to do so: the legislature incurs the cost of undermining public respect for Law by passing useless or conterproductive laws laden with unintended consequences.
Since Lott 2000, CDC 2003 and NAS 2004 found no measurable benefit from the anti-gun laws, and they obviously at least divert taxpayer dollars away from policies that are believed to work, there is no cost v benefit balance justifying outlawing pink guns (or "shoulder things that go up").
This re-enforces in my mind that legal, illegal, right and wrong are four different sets with varying intersecting subsets. Just because it is legal does not make it right.