People demonstrably commit murder and theft, abuse children, perform all kinds of atrocities, even if those acts are illegal… but I don’t know anyone who considers that a legitimate reason to legalize those acts.
That makes me suspect that people who present the “people will do X whether it’s illegal or not, so we should legalize X” argument for any particular X use it merely merely a soldier for the correct side, not as a compelling argument.
If you don’t expect people to do something, there is no reason to make it “illegal.” But “illegal” can mean many different things. It is illegal to jaywalk, but that will only rarely get you a ticket, if that. It is illegal to murder people, and if you murder someone you may well be executed. It is not (I believe) illegal to commit adultery, but it is grounds for divorce. It is not illegal to lie, but it is frowned upon.
There is some scale of “how much punishment is appropriate for this act.” Acts like lying are very hard to prosecute. Acts like jaywalking aren’t very problematic. There is some amount of punishment which is ideal, and some amount of enforcement which is ideal.
When people say “people will do X whether it’s illegal or not” the argument I perceive them to be making (and intended to make) is that increasing the penalties or prosecution for the crime in question will, at the margin, have a worse effect on crimes and welfare than leaving the laws constant. In part because everyone who is persecuting someone for having an abortion or smoking a joint is not trying to catch someone who has kidnapped children or committed murder, and adding more resources (at the margin) to those endeavors will be more worthwhile.
That’s a fine use of the principle of charity, and I endorse it on those grounds.
And I certainly agree that in many cases criminalizing (or more harshly prosecuting already-criminal) activity has a worse effect than legalizing it, and that this is absolutely an important argument to make where relevant.
I agree. This argument is only convincing for victimless “crimes”, and even then, to simply point out that a given “crime” is victimless is better still.
People demonstrably commit murder and theft, abuse children, perform all kinds of atrocities, even if those acts are illegal… but I don’t know anyone who considers that a legitimate reason to legalize those acts.
That makes me suspect that people who present the “people will do X whether it’s illegal or not, so we should legalize X” argument for any particular X use it merely merely a soldier for the correct side, not as a compelling argument.
If you don’t expect people to do something, there is no reason to make it “illegal.” But “illegal” can mean many different things. It is illegal to jaywalk, but that will only rarely get you a ticket, if that. It is illegal to murder people, and if you murder someone you may well be executed. It is not (I believe) illegal to commit adultery, but it is grounds for divorce. It is not illegal to lie, but it is frowned upon.
There is some scale of “how much punishment is appropriate for this act.” Acts like lying are very hard to prosecute. Acts like jaywalking aren’t very problematic. There is some amount of punishment which is ideal, and some amount of enforcement which is ideal.
When people say “people will do X whether it’s illegal or not” the argument I perceive them to be making (and intended to make) is that increasing the penalties or prosecution for the crime in question will, at the margin, have a worse effect on crimes and welfare than leaving the laws constant. In part because everyone who is persecuting someone for having an abortion or smoking a joint is not trying to catch someone who has kidnapped children or committed murder, and adding more resources (at the margin) to those endeavors will be more worthwhile.
That’s a fine use of the principle of charity, and I endorse it on those grounds.
And I certainly agree that in many cases criminalizing (or more harshly prosecuting already-criminal) activity has a worse effect than legalizing it, and that this is absolutely an important argument to make where relevant.
I agree. This argument is only convincing for victimless “crimes”, and even then, to simply point out that a given “crime” is victimless is better still.