Strategy for anarchy --- never-fail, time-tested

What makes citizens obey the law is not always their sterling character. Instead, fear of punishment -- the shame of arrest, fines or imprisonment -- more often makes us comply with laws. Law enforcement is not just a way to deal with individual violators but also a way to remind society at large that there can be no civilization without legality.

Or, as 17th-century British statesman George Savile famously put it: "Men are not hanged for stealing horses, but that horses may not be stolen."

In the modern world, we call such prompt, uniform and guaranteed law enforcement "deterrence," from the Latin verb meaning "to frighten away." One protester who disrupts a speech is not the problem. But if unpunished, he green-lights hundreds more like him.

Worse still, when one law is left unenforced, then all sorts of other laws are weakened.

The result of hundreds of "sanctuary cities" is not just to forbid full immigration enforcement in particular jurisdictions. They also signal that U.S. immigration law, and by extension other laws, can be ignored.

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The problem with ignoring laws is that it is contagious -- and can boomerang.

Sanctuary cities could in theory birth conservative sanctuary zones. Would today's protesters wish for other jurisdictions to nullify federal laws and court rulings concerning abortion, gun registration and gay marriage?

If thousands of Hondurans in a caravan are deemed above the law, then why not exempt future mass arrivals of Chinese or South African immigrants?

If Cruz and other Republican politicos can't eat in peace, will Barack Obama, Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi soon face the same disruptions -- the illegality justified by higher moral concerns?

If students can block a right-wing speaker or storm a diner, will they also object when anti-abortion protesters bar the passage of a pro-choice campus guest?

German philosopher Immanuel Kant noted that "anarchy is law and freedom without force."

Translated to our current context, Kant might say that all our high-minded talk about the Bill of Rights means absolutely nothing without the cop on the beat and the local district attorney.


 -- Victor Davis Hanson