{"id":21213,"date":"2022-11-15T18:50:39","date_gmt":"2022-11-15T18:50:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21213"},"modified":"2023-11-28T22:10:05","modified_gmt":"2023-11-28T22:10:05","slug":"a-look-at-the-you-cant-legislate-morals-myth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21213","title":{"rendered":"A Look at the &#8220;You-Can\u2019t-Legislate-Morals&#8221; Myth"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 3<\/p><p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">[<strong>Note: <\/strong>This MS is available in larger font on our <strong>New Uploads<\/strong> page.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">Every time someone wishes to perpetrate or justify some kind of societal moral evil, his or her watchword is, \u201cYou cannot legislate morals.\u201d This has been true of the protagonists for unlimited abortion, pornography, lax divorce\/remarriage laws, legal sale of liquor, and several other issues. It has been used extensively by the liquor interests and their agents in deceiving a gullible public.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">I submit to you that this statement is a myth and a lie. If \u201cYou can\u2019t legislate morals,\u201d then why is most of our legislation on the books? If the statement is true, then we should remove the laws that prohibit theft, arson, shoplifting, rape, prostitution, illegal drug use, armed robberies, grand larceny, income tax evasion, perjury, murder, and perhaps hundreds of other offenses\u2014all of which are rooted in personal morality or lack of it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">Admittedly, a law prohibiting a practice is never going to be obeyed without exception, be it a law of man or of God. However, God must believe that there is a value in \u201clegislating morals\u201d or He would not have used so many pages of the Bible forbidding His people to participate in certain types of behavior. But the sophisticated moderns know more than God. They would have us believe that God did not know what He was doing when He legislated man\u2019s moral behavior through His Word.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">Sensible, sober-thinking men and women still understand the value of laws relating to our moral behavior. The very fact that there is a law prohibiting legal sale of liquor in an area keeps a certain kind of \u201cmoral cloud\u201d hovering over it in the mind of youth and adult alike. When such a prohibition is stricken from the law, that which is detrimental to all health, happiness, and prosperity and is in every way unworthy of respect is given a measure of respectability by legalization.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">When a person says, \u201cYou can\u2019t legislate morals,\u201d what he really means is, \u201cI don\u2019t want any legislation against my favorite immoralitie<\/span>s.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\">[<strong>Note:<\/strong> I wrote this article for, and it was published in <em>The Edifier, <\/em>weekly bulletin of Pearl Street Church of Christ, Denton, TX, October 11, 1984, of which I was editor.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\"><strong>Attribution:<\/strong> From <em>thescripturecache.com<\/em>; Dub McClish, owner and administrator.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 3[Note: This MS is available in larger font on our New Uploads page.] Every time someone wishes to perpetrate or justify some kind of societal moral evil, his or her watchword is, \u201cYou cannot legislate morals.\u201d This has been true of the protagonists for&#8230;<\/p>\n<div class=\"easywp-readmore\"><a class=\"read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21213\">Continue Reading&#8230;<span class=\"easywp-sr-only\">  A Look at the &#8220;You-Can\u2019t-Legislate-Morals&#8221; Myth<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572,393,421,252,474,145,45,681,1039,108,29,253,33,487,1037,479],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-addiction","category-behavior","category-chastity-purity","category-dancing","category-drugs","category-immorality","category-law","category-liberals","category-liquor","category-marriage","category-mdr","category-modesty","category-moral-issues","category-murder","category-nudity","category-prostitution","wpcat-572-id","wpcat-393-id","wpcat-421-id","wpcat-252-id","wpcat-474-id","wpcat-145-id","wpcat-45-id","wpcat-681-id","wpcat-1039-id","wpcat-108-id","wpcat-29-id","wpcat-253-id","wpcat-33-id","wpcat-487-id","wpcat-1037-id","wpcat-479-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21213"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23413,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213\/revisions\/23413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}