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From: josh@topaz.ARPA (J Storrs Hall)
Newsgroups: net.legal
Subject: Re: How many laws are we subject to?
Message-ID: <135@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 3-Jan-85 23:07:58 EST
Article-I.D.: topaz.135
Posted: Thu Jan  3 23:07:58 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 6-Jan-85 00:43:00 EST
References: <449@mhuxt.UUCP>
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Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
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from Jeff Sonntag:

> I recently wanted to find out if something was legal locally or not, and the
> only way I could think of finding out was to post to this group.

The "standard" way to do it is ask a lawyer.  If you do, and he says it's
legal, you are generally considered as having acted in "good faith" that
you were obeying the law.  It will cost you money, however...

> Does anyone
> have any idea how many laws the average individual must currently avoid
> breaking?  My best guestimate is probably low, but I'll say a few thousand.

You ain't seen nothin yet.  There are over one million federal laws on the
books and theoretically in force.  Add your state laws, local ordinances,
and you have a whole passel of 'em.  Consider the fact that most people
have never read the actual full text of even a single law.  

Now before you give up hope, realize that even in theory it would not be
enough for you to know all these laws by heart--the interpretations of the
laws as applied to specific situations depend on a set of court rulings.
It is not uncommon for the judge in a case to give an "interpretation"
which out-and-out contradicts the literal words in the statute.
The sum total of this stuff constitutes an enormous library you couldn't
read in a lifetime.

> Now, considering these facts: 1.) There is no obvious way for the average
> citizen to find out whether some action would break the law, 2.) the average
> citizen must obey thousands of laws, 3.) If you break a law you didn't know
> about, you receive the full penalty anyway.  Doesn't it all seem loaded
> against us somehow?

Damn right!  One has to realize that what the people actually obey is 
only vaguely related to the words on the books, and what the police enforce
(you don't think they've read all that stuff either, do you?) is the same:
a kind of "social consciousness" that is much more like the structure
of a natural language than the rules of chess.  The legal resolution
process matches actions taken under the "general consciousness" law
and matches them to the "legal books" law in a rather arbitrary way--
you'd get about as much justice by flipping a coin (and save lots of money).

>     It sounds like a system set up by Swift!  I'm sure it was easier back
> when laws were fewer and closer to what could be considered 'right' and
> 'wrong', but now, a persons intuitive idea of what is right and wrong
> bears little resemblance to the unknown laws which he must obey.

Exactly.  What this means operationally is that we have a government of
men and not laws.

>     Could some 'fix' be made to stop this injustice?  Let's see - get rid
> of all unnecessary laws -- but which laws are unnecessary?, and who decides?
> Place some arbitrary limit to the number of state, local, and federal laws
> which can apply to individuals?

How about saying that a legislator can't propose, or vote for, a new law
unless he can recite, verbatim, all the laws currently in force?  I can 
hear the howls of laughter now--it would slam the legislative process to
a screeching halt--but doesn't it make sense that a legislator should
know all the laws?  Otherwise, isn't it an open admission that we can't
really expect the "ordinary people" to?  I think this illustrates just how
far the legal situation has diverged from reality.

>     Can it truly be 'right' to prosecute someone for disobeying a law which
> they never heard of, and which isn't about something which most people
> consider a moral issue?  

Or to put it in the terms I used above, prosecute someone for something
which is ok under the "social consciousness" law.  Obviously it's wrong.
We have gone too far along with the notion that law is made by a group
of popularity contest winners in a building in Washington.  It isn't--
good law is *discovered* like the rules of grammar or the laws of physics.

--JoSH