Laws regulating the grease doughnuts and other foods are fried in, requiring the use of helmets while riding a bike (motor or otherwise), preventing the use of cell phones while driving, dictating what one can listen to while crossing the street, requiring permission to enter a business, requiring the use of safety belts while driving, making it a crime to smoke in a particular location, and the myriad of other laws passed by elected representatives or even by the electorate as a whole through the initiative process are called ‘nanny’ laws because they all micromanage the life of the individual by government. 

There are many problems with these types of laws.  They are, but not necessarily all inclusive, 1) very difficult to enforce, 2) divert law enforcement resources from enforcing “real” crimes,

3) make criminals out of perfectly innocent individuals, and 4) lead to tyranny. 

The “nanny” laws are all well intended.  Few people want individuals to get hurt while riding their bike, to have an accident while driving a vehicle, or to die because of poor eating habits.  However, all of these laws miss the very point of a free society, which is to allow the individual to freely choose the type of life he or she wants to lead. 

The hoards of individuals that have immigrated to America and continue to do so today desire that freedom to choose their way of life.  They, as well as those individuals born in America, want to be able to choose their way of life even it is not the type of lifestyle others think is desirable. 

According to the Declaration of Independence all individuals have the right to pursue happiness with the emphasis on the word pursue.  No one has a right to happiness.  So long as an individual is not engineering force on another, the choice of how one lives is up to the individual.  Of course along with that choice of lifestyle comes the responsibility of either suffering the consequences or enjoying the benefits of such a lifestyle. 

That is the rub, though.  It appears many do not want to take on that necessary responsibility of free choice.  When one does not want to take on that responsibility, the result is to get a representative to convince his or her other representatives to make a law and/or circulate a petition to get the issue on the ballot so the electorate can make a law dictating to individuals how they should live their lives. 

These ‘nanny’ laws, though, do not help others become responsible, they only make criminals out of perfectly innocent people and divert precious law enforcement assets from seeking out individuals who in fact do utilize force on others through murder, theft, fraud, and other real crimes. 

Even when the ‘nanny” laws are passed there is always unintended consequences such as the low income individuals at the local work center being put out of a job because of the recently passed minimum wage law or the dispute of where individuals may smoke as a result of the recently passed smoking ban. 

Legal plunder is another name for such laws because now the law forces individuals to live a life thought proper by the majority and very few individuals intentionally want to break the law.  In the end not only do these laws not encourage the individual to take on the responsibility of free choice, but they actually create the very system of society unwanted by most individuals, tyranny. 

Make no mistake about it, as government force replaces free choice, tyranny is the end result.

Good law is the use of government force to restrict the use of force by one individual upon another.  To use the force of government for any other reason is dictatorial in nature and has no place in a free society.  See if the law takes from those and gives to others that if done by the individual himself would make him a criminal.  That law needs to be abolished and laws such as those need never see the light of day.

Tuesday, April 10 at 7 PM at the Booth Machinery conference hall located at Araby Road and 30^th Street, Mr. Michael Badnarik, 2004 Libertarian Party presidential candidate and author of the book, “Good to be King,” will speak on “The New Vanguard” at The Freedom Library annual awards ceremony where another three $1,000 scholarships will be awarded to local area participants in The Freedom Library Education and Scholarship Program.