Thomas Jefferson wrote that the U.S. Constitution gave Congress the power to “prosecute treason, forgery of United States titles and common coins, pirates and crimes committed on the high seas, and violations of international law and no other crime.” With this declaration, and knowing that Congress can amend or supplement the laws of this country with additional constitutional amendments, are federal laws constitutionally “legal”? Article. Section IV. 1. “The public records, archives and trials of every other State shall be given in every State with faith and gratitude. And Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such laws, records, and procedures are to be proved, and their effect. Does this law give Congress the ability to define what is criminal and what is not? Just think of how many things have been crimes since 2013 (add another 30 years to 1982). And just about everything is a crime — which is a life sentence for those convicted of a crime. Not all of these letters are up to date, so there you have it. Ask Congress to register all laws as of January 1, 2018, just to see how many laws are passed that year.
Even those that repeal other laws, as we must know, are not in force. Dave, as laws are added, other laws will become obsolete. Laws about what you can say on radio shows, for example, are useless in modern internet podcasts. In the future, aviation laws will be replaced by space laws, and so on. There will always be a stable number of laws with a purpose in the country. If there is not even an exact way to count existing laws, how are we supposed to know them well enough to comply? By having a system so convoluted that there is no way for a person to know whether their actions are legal or not, we create a situation where people do not respect the rule of law and, therefore, we have a failing society. Apparently, it is impossible to count the # of laws in the United States. What a sad observation of our current situation! In fact, the federal government went wild.
They have made so many laws that they cannot even be counted! A quote from George Washington: “For freedom to survive, it must sometimes drink the blood of patriots.” I now wonder if there is enough left to quench his thirst. We must be a people governed by consent. Do we really agree with that? ( » Are these volumes not digitized? It seems that a decent programmer could develop an algorithm not only to count laws, but also to account for overlapping laws that are being replaced. I believe that any laws that are passed will eventually make the United States a communist country. Does anyone support me? I come from Albania, from Europe, but this subject has occupied me a lot in recent years. It`s funny and scary to think that they don`t even know how many laws are actually in place. It is now assumed that after a certain age (in my country it is 18), everyone knows all the laws and that they are fully responsible for their actions. In my opinion, they do not even know a few lines of the constitution. The game is not leveled and it is very unfair if you are not born and raised in an environment that can protect them.
There are people who don`t even know about human rights (I certainly don`t remember all of them). There are all kinds of laws and regulations that restrict people with good intentions (which is the majority) rather than prevent people with bad intentions. I understand that the existence of a complex legal system leads lawyers to keep their jobs at the end of the day, but with it comes a very high price for ordinary people who are constantly afraid to dream big of changing their lives. It`s a perfect job for Watson, the supercomputer. Watson could “read” all federal laws and then respond with AI whether an action is legal or illegal. We have laws that make no sense and should be repealed or scrapped. The review of these laws must be done by a competent organization WITHIN the government and not by an external faction, there are enough people at Wash.DC to do so. If laws need to be revised, delete them and start with the period. Laws that cannot be explained cannot be observed rationally. This is even evident insofar as there may be two diametrically opposed laws that serve to lead to two separate convictions but are declared effective for the judiciary.
Therefore, one could easily argue that the number of laws we have is directly *because* we have a free democratic society that has existed for over 200 years, with a government that meets the legal needs of society. In 2011, Texas Governor Rick Perry signed 129 simultaneous resolutions sent to him by lawmakers, from one commemorating the late Governor Dolph Briscoe Jr. to another directing an employee to make technical corrections to Senate Bill 1420, which affected the Texas Department of Transportation. We asked Dorsch for a breakdown of the number of 40,000 by resolution and invoice. She said the group did not separate bills from resolutions during the count. Finally, we found two other entities with information about state-level bills coming into effect. The Council of State Governments, based in Lexington, Kentucky, publishes data on the number of bills and resolutions states pass each year. The information for 2011 is not ready yet, but to put things in perspective, we looked at 2010.
If we include only bills passed by legislators in states that the governor did not veto, we counted 14,227.