Can morality be compelled by law? Certainly, we can't force a populace to act virtuously--and still less can holiness be compulsory--since virtue must be taught and then inculcated through practice. But this doesn't mean that there is no place in the legal system for morality. In a sense, every bit of legislation is a moral imperative, if only a weak one.
However, there are two sides (at least) to morality, as witnessed by the Confiteor said in Mass. "I confess to almighty God and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned, in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done and in what I have failed to do." There are thoughts, words, and deeds which can be immoral. The law can't (and shouldn't try) to compel moral thoughts, and the case for moral "speech codes" is tenuous at best. However, there is a great difference between discouraging bad (immoral) actions and encouraging good (virtuous) actions.
As Dr Feser puts it,
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"We need, for example, to draw a distinction between requiring good actions and forbidding evil ones. Now it is not true without qualification even to say that the former cannot result in true virtue. On the contrary, as every good Aristotelian knows, that is what child-rearing is all about. Children first need to get in the habit of doing what is good – and to be punished for failing to do so – before they can understand the point of doing so, and thus before they can meaningfully choose to do so. By the time they are adults, ingraining good habits in this way is much more difficult. Still, precisely for this reason – that is to say, precisely because adults are adults and thus both responsible for themselves and at least to some extent set in their ways – it is usually counterproductive to try to force them to do what is good in the hope that genuinely virtuous character will result from this. Thus there is to that extent truth...that virtue – at least in an adult – must be freely chosen."
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Virtue must be chosen. Morality, however, can be (and in some cases should be) compelled, at least to the extent of discouraging evil acts.
Tags: Morality Religion Political-Philo Sophy
