The Portland daily press., 1869-01-20
Two Kinds of Laws.

From some reason there has of late been oh
servabe in newspapers. in puollc .adrvs.v-
and even in sermons and official papers an at
tempt to make discrimination between laws
that deserve the respect and obedience of good
: citizens and those which do Lot. The laws that
are to be respected and obeyed are those which
are approved by public sentiment" laws
which not to be regarded or obeyed are
those that "public sentiment does not APP
prove" ..., --. il. .---..-.. lr,..... 49,
We protest that the efficiency of laws is not
thus to be left at the mercy of mere phrase,
especially of a phrase of so general a nature
as public sentiment" No more demoralizing
and anarcbieal doctrine can be promulgated
than that an individual is at liberty, before
yielding obedience to the rules that society has
framed for its government, to determine for
himself whether those rules are true expo
nents of the popular will. The sphere of in
dividual observation is so limited that no one
is competent to make an induction of facts
sufficiently large to overcome the conclusiUe
presumption raised by the existence of
statute that it truly represents the wishes
and commands Of the people of the State. To
question the validity Of laws on such grounds
is tHc uESG bJep iOMdIuS TSUPllOn. L ct 80
thoroughly has the idea of an adverse public
sentiment" obtained possession of some minds
that one constantly hears the fact that the
laws are violated adduced by those aoho are dis
obedie'at 10 them as proof that the people do
not sustain them and that their violation is a
mere nominal offense which is rather credita-
BILE than otherwise Such logicians, we la
ment to say, sometimes have high official au-
thority for their sophistries, SO that it has be-
come common thing at least, if not in icourt,
before that tribunal of ministerial officials
upon whom the initiation of prosecutions is
incumbent, to plead hostile public sentiment
in bar of legal proceedings for the punishment
of crime. r..- .... .-.., 30,
Hence arise what are known in popular par
lance as "dead letter laws"-Sunday laws,
laws against profanity, liquor laws. Criminals
arraigned for disobeying them are victims"
prosecutions become prosecutions. An object
of legal punishment becomes an object of pop.
ular sympathy and commiseration Therefore
the criminal statutes might be bound in two
volumes, one to be kept ever fresh and new
for want of perusal, aud the other dog. cared
and worn by the fingers of persons anxious to
find out what they cannot do 10Th ir,ap1,aity.
This is all wrong No law is a dead letter"
that has not been deprived of the popular
sanction in the authorized way There can
be, in republic, no possible evidence even
heard in derogation of the authority of
statute that is unrepealed. That it is a statute
is conclusive evidence that the people desire
to be governed by it. If the veto power of
popular sentiment is to be granted at all. it is
tod N Ona-thara ;+z4 IL
influence. Each man may subject a law to
the arbitrament of his own judgment, and
after be has reached conclusion he will have
no difficulty in discovering public sentiment
TO sustain his own views. The grosser crimes,
murder arson, burglary aud rape, are not
hKeiy to obtain for themselves impunity in
TINS way, but offences of secondary nature,
those which have their natural result in Grim
inality of higher grade sometimes do. The
good order of society and the succass of self
government depend in large measure os Mn
tesquieu discovered years ago not mo, tho
severity of punishments, but upon Their .o,.-
tainty and promptness. 1t is a grave misto,.o
to suppose that there is anything in the nature
of democratic government that limits the
scope of laws-that there is anything undem
ocradc in sumptuary regulations. Nothing
can impair the validity of law but the want
of legitimate authority in the power that I'M
dertakes to enact it. Tie government of re-
public may be as despotic as can be conceived
without giving any more rational ground of
complaint than an individual has against him.
self to hair shirt and bread and water diet.
There is but one kind of criminal law, and
public sentiment is not plea even in extenu-
alton of the offense of disobeying it.