As for laws: are there really that many
more, in proportion to the general population?
I have on my shelves the volumes of laws published each year by the Washington State Legislature. This year they ran 2,500 pages. Last year, 2200 pages. 1997 was a big year, 3000+ pages. That's not all brand new law, of course; some of it is only minor changes in existing laws where they have to print a page or two of old law to show the new law, but it's still a lot of law. That's just one state. And it's just the legislative laws, doesn't include all the regulations that state agencies turn out which also have the force of law. Plus there are two local legislative bodies governing my behavior, San Juan County and the Town of Friday Harbor, and their separate regulatory bodies pumping out regs. Then there's the "judge made" common or case law. So far in 1999 there are over 3,000 pages of appellate case law just in Washington. Add in 49 other states and all the counties, cities, and towns, and their case laws. And then the federal government (as a historian I assume you are familiar with the Federal Register--hundreds of pages daily). And the many, many federal district courts and their published decisions, not to mention eleven circuit courts of appeal and the Supreme Court, which is the least of all because they take so few cases.
There is an incredible amount of law being made every day. I have just the Washington State statutes, regulations, and case law on CD Rom and it they just expanded from three to four CD Roms. That's a LOT of law.
I do not believe it is physically possible for any adult (except perhaps those institutionalized in prisons or hospitals or nursing homes or the like) in America to go through an entire day without breaking at least one law. |
