IF WE START CRIMINALIZING OUR SINS, WHERE DO WE STOP?

We would be a happier people if we made more clear the distinction
between sin and crime. Sin is an offense against God. Crime is an
offense against man. Most crimes are also sins, because God tends to
judge our devotion to Him by how we treat our fellow men. But
relatively few sins are, or ought to be, crimes. God will one day
judge sinners in a court of His choosing.

It smacks of double jeopardy to punish sinners in temporal courts as
well. Our system of government is derived from the principles of
Protestant Christianity. Neither liberty nor democracy will survive
for long if we depart much further from them. But liberty also is
threatened when we rely upon coercion to promote moral values, and we
gain little from this effort.

Laws against immorality tend to be futile in the absence of a social
consensus supporting morality, and unnecessary if such a consensus
exists. If we criminalize only that conduct that harms others or
threatens public safety, we can create a social atmosphere in which
tolerance can flourish.

Government would neither be shoving morality down the throats of some,
or of-fending the morality of others. I am thinking here chiefly of
the so-called "victimless crimes" of gambling, prostitution and drug
use. All three can accurately be described as ubiquitous, despite a
host of statutes against them. And we step into the quicksand of
hypocrisy when we attempt to enforce these laws.

Why are state lotteries - where the odds of winning are much less than
at nickel slots - "good," while casino gambling is "bad?" What is the
moral difference between the hooker on the corner flagging motorists,
and the pretty young thing who marries a rich old guy for his money,
or the executive who sleeps with her boss to get a promotion? And
which is the greater threat to public morals: a section in a city like
Hamburg's Reeperbahn where prostitution is legal? Or television
sitcoms which glorify loveless sex?

In spite of - in some respects because of - the unstinting efforts of
courageous law enforcement officials, the drug cartels are larger and
more diffuse than ever; more cocaine and heroin are entering the
United States, and marijuana has become our No. 1 cash crop.

All we have to show for our interminable "war on drugs" are some
appalling intrusions upon our civil liberties and the destabilization
of several Latin American countries.

We treat consumers of illegal drugs as if they were victims, and
producers and distributors as if they were the most heinous of
criminals. But drugs do such harm as they do only when they are
ingested. If all people did was carry lumps of cocaine around like pet
rocks, no harm would be done. As it is, most of the social harm we
attribute to drugs is more a product of their being illegal than of
what people do under their influence.

Those who favor criminalizing sin say people need to be protected from
themselves. But there are all sorts of destructive behaviors - voting
Democratic, for instance - we would never dream of making illegal. If
we start criminalizing behaviors that are not in themselves
threatening to others, where do we stop?

Some health nazis want to ban tobacco. Others would prohibit SUVs, or
the wearing of fur. There is no shortage of people who want to tell
others how to live.

Decriminalization of sin could lead to more effective social
sanctions. It's no business of the government's if unmarried people -
even unmarried people of the same sex - wish to cohabit. But no
apartment owner who believes such behavior is immoral should be
required to rent to them.

We may decide it is unsound public policy to imprison people who use
drugs. But employers should be permitted to express their disapproval
in their hiring and promotion policies.

The political scientist Harold Lasswell coined the terms "public
order" and "civic order" to distinguish between government and the web
of private decisions and voluntary associations that constitute the
stuff of everyday life.

The public order is government. The civic order is family,
neighborhood, church, business enterprises, labor unions, professional
associations, and civic groups.

The public order is the nation's club. But the civic order is the
nation's conscience. We must provide enough latitude for that
conscience to operate.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jack Kelly is a member of The Blade's national bureau.