The Badger Herald

OPINION & EDITORIAL

Questioning morality’s legislation

Looking for a print version?
Simply choose ‘Print’ on your computer and a printer-friendly document will be generated.

Also by Jamie Shookman:

State must protect even worst felons (November 29, 2004)
Osama threat ineffective (November 5, 2004)
Limiting abortions to rape not realistic (October 22, 2004)
Citizens set bad example (October 5, 2004)
Sport weekends underrated (September 20, 2004)

by Jamie Shookman

Thursday, December 9, 2004

Professional sports may have reached an all-time low last month.

Hockey players are on strike and whining about salaries, basketball players are attacking fans, and baseball’s best are admitting to years of steroid use.

Sure, athletes have never been squeaky clean: There always seems to be an Olympic medal stripped here, a football player addicted to pain-killers there, and an array of suspensions and arrests for behavioral problems on and off the field. Yet looking at everything witnessed in the last month, it would appear that the conduct of these competitive and oftentimes overly aggressive athletes has gone from bad to worse.

As a nation, are we supposed to sit back and watch some of the country’s most powerful, wealthy and talented citizens embarrass not only themselves but the teams and leagues for which they play? Are we supposed to let the people who regularly fill the pages of our newspapers, decorate the walls of children’s rooms and cover our cities’ billboards act in a way that would be unacceptable for anyone else?

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain seems to think not. The senator announced Saturday that if Major League Baseball players and their owners do not adopt stricter drug testing measures by January, he would introduce legislation enforcing mandatory testing standards.

The U.S. Congress would certainly have the ability to pass such legislation under the Commerce Clause. The clause from Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution states that Congress can regulate commerce with foreign nations and between states. Major League Baseball players are drawn from nearly every state and a variety of other nations, fans from all over the country buy tickets and apparel, and contracts with the media and other endorsements are national, interstate agreements. Such legislation would be a pretty clear-cut case of something that falls under the confines of the commerce clause and is therefore within Congress’s governing scope.

Therefore, the question isn’t can Congress pass such legislation, but should it. Issuing testing standards isn’t a matter of public safety, public health or even the legality of the substances for which the athletes are tested. It’s a matter of publicly asserting a level of morality. Requiring drug-testing would serve to clean up Major League Baseball, but more importantly, it would send the message to athletes and citizens alike that as a country, we will demand a higher level of conduct and integrity from professional athletes.

It would tell those whose salaries rely on ticket sales and other purchases from the general public that steroids are an unacceptable, dishonest way of attaining their levels of performance and fame.

The truth is that the United States passes laws legislating morality all the time. Taxing based on income is a moral decision, based on the belief that increased earnings comes with an increased responsibility to society in the form of taxes. Even statutory rape can be considered moral legislation. If sexual intercourse between an adult and a consenting minor causes no harm to the younger person, what reason do we have to ban it other than as a society, we see it as something morally reprehensible?

Of course, there comes a point when legislating morality infringes on individual freedom, yet this point is hard to determine. Should pornography be outlawed? Does allowing it to continue as an industry send a message that we as a society find it morally acceptable? Those supporting a ban on abortion back up their claims on completely moral grounds, and one of the most controversial, current debates questions whether the government has the right to control what would otherwise be a moral decision by the mother of an unborn child. Anything that seems to limit individual decisions certainly causes divisions in our society, showing that to a large degree, we are nervous about letting our government influence our moral decisions.

In the case of Major League Baseball, imposing mandatory drug-testing standards is a moral legislation in which the benefits outweigh any restricted freedom among players and owners. The use of performance-enhancing drugs is a practice that almost everyone can agree is fundamentally wrong, but one in which unfortunately far too many athletes partake. Such legislation would improve the overall morale of Major League Baseball, and perhaps professional sports in general. It might even have ripple effects, sending the message to owners and players in other sports leagues that they had better solve their problems before Congress does.

In all likelihood, the threat of Sen. McCain’s legislation will probably scare the MLB into shaping up before intervention is even required. Yet if this is not the case, McCain will be more than ready to use his powers granted by the Commerce Clause to start drafting legislation that imposes the morality our professional athletes have recently failed to show.

Jamie Shookman (jlshookman@wisc.edu) is a junior majoring in English and political science.

Feedback

Show all comments

Hide anonymous comments

Anonymous (December 9, 2004 @ 4:28am):

Gee whiz babe, TY for that commerce clause analysis --- nice to see you tryin' out the new styles and all but here's the deal:
the commerce clause is not everything. there are limits. oh you know, shit like wickard, and lopez...
Ok, so you can make your commerce clause case, then what?

there is that pesky little 4th amendment (you know that whole search and seizure thing--probable cause warrants, etc) that might get in the way of your compulsory testing ambitions for professional sports.

If you seriously think the FEDS can just knock on your door and demand a blood sample without a warrant and absent exigent circumstances....

Anonymous (December 9, 2004 @ 5:03am):

Ok me again. I decided to read another one of your articles to see if this was an isolated ignorant event or a pattern of intellectual abuse. My diagnosis is that you are retarded.

You wrote: "Furthermore, rape victims that cannot afford a private attorney would be forced to seek a public defender. While private attorneys can choose which cases they try, public defenders typically work in understaffed offices that handle hundreds upon hundreds of felony cases a year. It is unfeasible for rape to be proven in all -- or even most -- cases before a child's birth. If there is any chance of a resolution before this point, there is a much smaller chance that one would be reached within the first or second trimester of pregnancy. If such cases are pushed through the system in time, it will place a strain on our already overburdened judicial system and further delay other felony trials."

PUBLIC DEFENDERS REPRESENT INDIGENT CRIMINAL DEFENDANTS.....HELLO?!?!?!

What you MEAN is Legal Aid...pro bono, etc.

Honey, you can't just up and delay a criminal trial like that----remember that thing about the 6th amendment...? Look it up.

P.S. you grossly misunderstand roe v. wade.

I suggest you do some research before you ever write again. You write in nauseating generalizations that you don't comprehend yourself.

Lay off the bong babe!

Anonymous (December 9, 2004 @ 5:04am):

What the hell happened to this paper? Keep these people away from the kegerator.

Anonymous (December 9, 2004 @ 4:40pm):

"Taxing based on income is a moral decision, based on the belief that increased earnings comes with an increased responsibility to society in the form of taxes."

Since when is deciding the tax burden a moral decision? Taxes, because they have NOTHING to do with morality, should be decided on purely economic grounds. And guess what? It turns out that having a middle class makes great economic sense. Progressive taxation makes great economic sense.

**********
"Issuing testing standards isn't a matter of public safety, public health or even the legality of the substances for which the athletes are tested. It's a matter of publicly asserting a level of morality."

No. It's a matter of public safety and public health. It's not a morality issue.

You know who thinks like that? John McCain. That's probably why he said, "The important aspect of this issue is not Barry Bonds or Jason Giambi or Gary Sheffield. The important aspect of this issue is that high school kids all over America believe that this is the only way they can make it. Ask any high school coach.

This is the tragedy of steroids. And we all know that it will destroy a young person's body. And that's why we've got to bring this to a halt."

As you can see from that quote, the reason why John McCain is bringing steroids to a halt is the same reason why Mike Tyson bit Holyfield's ear: he did it for the children.
*********

"Even statutory rape can be considered moral legislation. If sexual intercourse between an adult and a consenting minor causes no harm to the younger person, what reason do we have to ban it other than as a society, we see it as something morally reprehensible?"

A consenting minor? A minor doesn't have the legal ability to give consent. Hence them being a minor. We have these laws because there are severe problems with people exploiting minors. Severe health problems, social problems, and legal problems.
*****

You don't get your morality from Major League Baseball or (God help you!) from Congress. You get it from the Bible. You get it from the Koran. You get it from your parents, your friends, or yourself. Legislating it is usually not a good idea, not because it's necessarily right or wrong, but because it's not usually effective, sound legislation.