Objective laws are laws that confine government to its one legitimate function: protecting individual rights. Laws must be objective in both form and substance. In form, the law must allow each individual to know, before taking any action, what conduct is illegal, why it is forbidden, and what will be the penalty for violation. In substance, the law must forbid only such private conduct as violates the individual rights of others. Laws against murder, for example, satisfy both requirements. Objective law is the indispensable basis for a “government of laws and not of men.” When law is clear and precise, it leaves no room for bureaucrats or policemen to exercise arbitrary power through unpredictable, subjective decisions. For instance, note the crucial contrast between the law of homicide and the law of antitrust, which forbids “unreasonable restraints of trade,” a foggy term that can be applied to any business transaction—or not, as the prosecutor pleases. Because government exercises a monopoly on the legal use of force, government’s every action must be objectively controlled and explicitly authorized. Such rigid constraints leave private citizens alone to pursue their lives, free of the perpetual fear experienced under a regime of non-objective law.
Posted on: Mon, 23 Sep 2013 23:55:50 +0000
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