It Is Dangerous to Be Right When the Government Is Wrong - Andrew P. Napolitano [136]
Does the government exist to protect our freedoms, or do we exist to serve it? It takes our property and our money against our will. Anyone willing to see through Big Government and unafraid to challenge it can answer that question. If the government derives its powers from the consent of the governed, as the Declaration of Independence declares, and if the governed cannot take their neighbor’s property against the neighbor’s will without violating the Natural Law, how can the governed have created a government that can morally do so?
239
Chapter 14
A Ride on Dr. Feinberg’s Bus:
The Right to Be Governed by Laws with Moral Limits
Imagine catching the bus on your way to class, work, the doctor’s office, or coffee with a friend. You hop on board, grab a seat, and proceed to gaze out the window.1 All of a sudden, the vile stench of a passenger grabs your attention, and you look over to see a strobe light–carrying, stereo-blasting man who plops down in the seat next to yours. He reaches for a chalkboard in his bag and scratches his fingernails across its length. You politely ask him to stop, but he refuses.
As the goose bumps on your arm reach their peak, you make eye contact with a woman seated on the floor who is scratching, drooling, coughing, and burping relentlessly. She is sprawled out on a tablecloth in the aisle of the bus (in the back so as not to create a safety hazard), making a picnic lunch of live cockroaches, soft dog food, and rotten eggs—all sautéed in garlic and onions.
You recoil in disgust and are positive the bus populace cannot get any worse. The bus driver brakes, and a crowd of mourners boards with a coffin in tow. As they saunter past you, a pallbearer’s T-shirt comes into view. It is a depiction of Jesus hanging from the cross with the caption: “Hang in there, baby!” One of the other pallbearers is using an American flag as a shawl, wiping her tears and blowing her nose into the stars and stripes.
You attempt to ignore the chaos that surrounds you when a couple directly across the aisle catches your eye. They are kissing, hugging, petting, and fondling one another with sound effects to accompany their grossly inappropriate visual. The man takes off articles of his girlfriend’s clothing, leaving little to be imagined.
240
To avoid the peep show, you stand up and move forward a few benches. A loud and boisterous young man approaches and asks if he can take a seat. “Of course,” you respond. He proceeds to rant ad nauseam about the weather, politics, his favorite TV show, the bus’s leisurely speed, and the burnt toast he ate for breakfast. You take out your newspaper to hint you have no desire to chat, but you are unable to make him stop. To add to your torment, two nasally voices are screeching at an ungodly decibel in the seats behind you.
Head pounding and searching for some kind of relief, you look toward the bus driver whose reproachful eyes signal the entrance of a group of teenage hooligans. Attempting to put the other bus passengers in fear of their lives, the first teenager pretends to pull the pin on a (very realistic) hand grenade, while the second teenager stabs his friends with a fake, rubber knife. The third, fourth, and fifth teenagers—all wearing armbands with emblazoned swastikas—carry cardboard signs with utterly offensive racial and ethnic slurs that denigrate Catholics, blacks, Jews, and Hispanics.
Now ask yourself: Is any of this conduct so reprehensible that it can be considered harmful enough to justify criminal punishment? The late Professor Joel Feinberg, who taught me philosophy at Princeton University, depicted this motley cast of characters as part of a classic study on the types of conduct which can merit criminal punishment, and the types which cannot. As we shall explore below,