Somewhere along the way, we stopped thinking. We started reacting.
When things go sideways these days, notice how quickly people reach for the phone to call their representatives. Society has developed this strange reflex, treating legislation like some kind of magic spell. As if writing words on government letterhead somehow makes only the bad stuff disappear while leaving everything else untouched.
The deeper questions about why problems exist in the first place get buried under urgent demands for new bills. The diagnosis gets skipped entirely; everyone is too busy demanding medicine for symptoms nobody’s properly identified.
Skeptical? Step into the SC legislative chaos for just one day. Our Legislators field constant calls from constituents demanding new regulations for every perceived problem. Meanwhile, social media platforms overflow with petition campaigns, organized rallies, and impassioned calls to action, all unified by a single solution: more government, more bills, more restrictions.
Want more proof? Over 2000 bills have already been filed this session. And this is just year one of a two-year session. More bills are coming in year two.
Laws are meant to protect life, liberty, and property - that’s their core purpose. They were never created to eliminate every inconvenience citizens face in daily life or to shield people from the consequences of irresponsible actions. The legal system wasn’t designed to generate endless government assistance programs that create dependency.
All a law can do is assign consequences. Legal ones. Which, last I checked, doesn’t apply only to “them.” They apply to you.
Every law you support becomes a weapon you’re willing to hand the state - complete with police power and enforcement mechanisms. That means the thing you thought would ‘just stop the bad guys’ now puts everyone - including you - under the same microscope.
But most don't think that far ahead. They're too caught up in demanding that "something must be done!" So the government does what it always does. It churns out more legalese, stretches its authority, bulks up its workforce, and piles on new regulations. Then everyone stands around, somehow surprised that nothing actually improved, except now they need permission slips just to breathe.
The most dangerous time in the life of bad government is when it pretends to fix itself. When lawmakers scramble to clean up their own mess, they reach for more power and more control. And the result? A polished version of the same broken thing, with a new name and a longer rulebook.
Even Supreme Court justices are asking the question. “America has always been a nation of laws. But today our laws have grown so vast and reach so deeply into our lives that it’s worth asking: In our reverence for law, have we gone too far?” ~Justice Neil Gorsuch
If even the guardians of our laws are sounding alarms, we've crossed a line.
We are overruled. And we’ve done it to ourselves.
The consequences reach far beyond just having too many laws. The moment the state steps in to ‘help’ clean up someone’s bad decisions, it tells everyone those decisions aren’t really theirs to carry. It’s the same principle we see in helicopter parenting - control every choice, override every failure, and you end up with adults who can’t think for themselves. When you remove consequences, you remove responsibility. We’re raising generations of dependent adults waiting to be rescued when things go wrong. We’re raising generations of people who’ve never had to bear the fallout of their choices because the state won’t let them.
We are training adults to be dependent children.
The appetite for accountability has disappeared from our public conversations. Enforcing laws we already have takes patience and steady pressure. These qualities get lost in the excitement of demanding brand new legislation.
The laws we get today aren't clean, principled documents. They're paper monsters that go on for dozens of pages nobody reads, crammed with exceptions and regulatory fine print. A cruel irony appears when you look closer. All that complexity actually helps problems survive instead of solving them. Those loopholes we thought we were closing become lifelines for the very behaviors everyone wanted gone in the first place.
You want to know how bad behavior survives? It survives through definitions, exceptions, and regulatory carve-outs. All those fine-print details people think are “strengthening” a law? They’re exactly how the rot stays alive. By the time people realize what they’ve built when enforcement hits home, it’s too late. The law’s already codified and the enforcement is marching.
Remember 2020? Entire rights erased overnight, all 'justified' by emergency law. It's hard to believe there was a group of people that actively pushed for these restrictions.
What happened to the rule of law?
That principle once meant laws were actually enforced when violated, not simply ignored. When a law proves unconstitutional or ineffective at addressing real harm, citizens should call for its repeal rather than refinement. Today, we’ve abandoned both enforcement and repeal in favor of constant addition.
The rule of law has become rule by law.
The weaponization of legislation is complete when the mere existence of a law justifies anything.
Whatever gets written into code becomes justifiable even if it violates rights, erodes due process, or contradicts everything decent people once agreed on.
We need to return to the rule of law and repeal the mountains of unconstitutional nonsense already choking the people.
Liberty doesn’t strengthen when we nourish the very systems designed to consume it. Each morsel of freedom surrendered becomes fuel for the machinery of control.
So the next time someone says, “There ought to be a law,” ask them why they aren’t enforcing the ones we already have. Ask them what right they’re willing to hand over this time.
Stop begging for more chains. Start defending your freedom.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not constitute legal or professional advice. ConservaTruth assumes no liability for any actions taken based on this content. Read more.
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