On a recent holiday trip to the Boston area, I picked up the Boston Globe and read an article about "ethics lapses" among state officials in Massachusetts. The details aren't important here. But in commenting on his plan to address the problem, Gov. Deval Patrick said the following:

"No one can legislate morality, we all know that," Patrick said at a news conference. "But we can assure ourselves and the public that the consequences for breaching the public trust will be serious, swift, and certain."

"No one can legislate morality"? Think about that. Patrick is wrong. Morality is the only thing you can legislate! Think about it. What is a law? A law tells you what you can or cannot do. It legislates what is right and wrong.

Greg Koukl at the excellent Stand to Reason organization awoke me to this truth a number of years ago. He has a recent article that touches on this issue called, "Does God Take Sides? Why Political Partisanship is Morally Obligatory." From his piece:

All politics—as an enterprise of civilization—is moral. The entire debate about politics, pursued at least under the American system, can be reduced to a single question: What is the proper use of force to accomplish moral ends? People say you can’t legislate morality. All legislation is a moral enterprise. If there is not a justification for the use of power, then that use of power is illicit. That is what despots do. Aristotle said famously that all law rests upon the necessary foundation of morality.

Check it out.