In Hoc Anno Hominis?

In the past I have enjoyed the fact that The Wall Street Journal annually runs its traditional Christmas editorial "In Hoc Anno Domini."  I suppose that is because traditions have a cumulative effect, and I like that the editors of the paper have not bowed to contemporary pressure to diminish the significance of the holiday by reducing it to consumption or mere family time.

This year, however, I am finally able to give explicit expression to what has never sat completely well with me about the traditional editorial (reproduced in full below).

Law and Moral Philosophy

Yesterday Robert H. Bork died.  He was as polarizing a figure in American culture, politics, and jurisprudence as he was significant.

In recognition of his significance, the editors of The Wall Street Journal compiled excerpts from a number of Judge Bork's writings.  One of those in particular struck me as worth reproducing.  It concerns the public perception of law and morality.  This perception, often confused, is a subject that I have noted previously (e.g., here, here, and here).

A person does not need to agree with Judge Bork to acknowledge the helpful clarity of his thinking and how that lucidity, even incisiveness, contributes to public discourse about matters of substance.

OPINION

The Wall Street Journal

The Wisdom of Robert Bork

  “Their Will Be Done,” July 5, 2005

Once the justices depart, as most of them have, from the original understanding of the principles of the Constitution, they lack any guidance other than their own attempts at moral philosophy, a task for which they have not even minimal skills. Yet when it rules in the name of the Constitution, whether it rules truly or not, the Court is the most powerful branch of government in domestic policy. The combination of absolute power, disdain for the historic Constitution, and philosophical incompetence is lethal.

The Court's philosophy reflects, or rather embodies and advances, the liberationist spirit of our times. In moral matters, each man is a separate sovereignty. In its insistence on radical personal autonomy, the Court assaults what remains of our stock of common moral beliefs. That is all the more insidious because the public and the media take these spurious constitutional rulings as not merely legal conclusions but moral teachings supposedly incarnate in our most sacred civic document.

A version of this article appeared December 20, 2012, on page A19 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: The Wisdom of Robert Bork.

Against Fairness

I have addressed the matter of "fairness" in a number of prior posts.  It is an important moral sense, but one that has more than one facet, as I explained previously.  It is also a cultural watchword that can distort as much as illuminate our activities.

The following excerpt from today's Wall Street Journal finds closest affinity with a short piece on gratitude as outlined by Roger Scruton.

The Wall Street Journal
Notable & Quotable
Stephen T. Asma on the social threat of 'fairness.'

Prof. Stephen T. Asma in his new book Against Fairness (University of Chicago Press):

Our contemporary hunger for equality can border on the comical. When my six-year-old son came home from first grade with a fancy winner's ribbon, I was filled with pride to discover that he had won a footrace. While I was heaping praise on him, he interrupted to correct me. "No, it wasn't just me," he explained. "We all won the race!" He impatiently educated me. He wasn't first or second or third—he couldn't even remember what place he took. Everyone who ran the race was told that they had won, and they were all given the same ribbon. "Well, you can't all win a race," I explained to him, ever-supportive father that I am. That doesn't even make sense. He simply held up his purple ribbon and raised his eyebrows at me, as if to say, "You are thus refuted." . . .

More troubling than the institutional enforcement of this strange fairness is the fact that such protective "lessons" ill-equip kids for the realities of later life. As our children grow up, they will have to negotiate a world of partiality. Does it really help children when our schools legislate reality into a "fairer" but utterly fictional form? The focus on equality of outcome may produce a generation that is burdened with an indignant sense of entitlement.

A version of this article appeared November 18, 2012, on page A19 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Notable & Quotable.

Ancient Greek Tragedies and Our Own

I have been rereading some ancient Greek tragedies, and I am impressed by how relevant their themes remain, especially for our struggles in families and societies.

The Current State of Irreligion

Two recent publications caught my eye on the subject of religion -- or, more precisely, irreligion -- in the United States.  Let me briefly list them, highlight the main points, and add a comment or two.

On Legislating Morality

Back in July, I posted an entry that I called "Two Separate Spheres of Life?"   In it I questioned the common separation of moral questions from political ones.  At the end of a more recent post, the last in my series on James Q. Wilson's The Moral Sense, I commented on the ubiquity of morality.  By that I meant that we encourage habits and promote views of morality in one way or another even when we are not always aware that we are doing so.

Not long ago, I ran across a discussion related (but not identical) to these thoughts, "Why We Can't Help But Legislate Morality" by Micah Watson.   It is closest to the ideas in the former post, but it has the advantage of being briefer and clearer than both of my entries.

Prof. Watson focuses on law, not politics strictly speaking, but his main point basically concurs with mine back in July.   He observes, "... every law and regulation that is proposed, passed, and enforced has inherent in it some idea of the good that it seeks to promote or preserve.  Indeed, no governing authority can in any way be understood to be morally neutral. ... To legislate, then, is to legislate morality."

For some, Prof. Watson's perspective may be old hat; for others, it may help to crystallize a sneaking suspicion and make sense of heated policy debates.

His essay does not argue for a particular form of legislation.  Instead, it suggests that our often controversial conversations about various laws will be aided if we can do at least two things: (1) move beyond denying that legislation imposes a moral vision and (2) recognize that it in fact always does.

We will make more civil progress together, I take him to be intimating, if we can -- without excluding questions of operational efficiency, prospective success, and potential blowback -- focus on the moral aspects that a law reflects.  Conversations can then more squarely engage what the legislators seek to promote as a moral goal and the means proposed to accomplish it.

Of Rage and the Man

While reflecting in a recent post on the relationship between emotions and moral character, I noted that our culture, it seems, still privileges reason over emotion.  Often this occurs to the denigration or exclusion of  emotion.  It is true:  sometimes human passions can be so powerful as to result in miscalculation and excesses that are contrary to the balance inherent in a virtuous life.  But that is not necessarily the case, as I was reminded while rereading Homer's epic poems.