| Smoking Ban: Arms And The Majority |
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| Written by Craig Westover |
| Friday, 25 April 2008 10:04 |
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What is needed is a little more gun control. On March 14, City of Babbitt Chief of Police Terry Switajewski, his service weapon holstered at his side, issued a ticket to Thomas Marinaro, owner of Tank's Bar. Marinaro has been violating Minnesota's statewide smoking ban by hosting 'Theater Night' at Tank's. Marinaro's customers assume the roles of actors and smoke cigarettes under the theater exemption in the state smoking ban law. According to Marinaro's attorney Mark Benjamin, Marinaro lit a cigarette, put his ticket in a frame and proudly hung it on the wall, declaring he will continue to host Theater Night in his bar "even if tickets rain down like confetti." While we wait to see how Marinaro's case plays out in court, it is illustrative to point out that should he extend his bravado and opposition to the smoking ban to open resistance, Marinaro faces the death penalty. Not just a metaphoric "death penalty," meaning the state might close his bar. There is the "give me liberty or give me death" penalty. Behind every law is a gun. We take it for granted that if we're mugged at knifepoint or our home invaded in the dark of night, police will pursue the mugger and the burglar and use whatever "necessary force" is required to bring the evildoer to justice. In the pursuit of lawbreakers, government is granted a monopoly on force. We say "amen" to use of force when the lawbreaker is a mugger, burglar or worse; we conveniently ignore that government has the same monopoly on force to compel a hitherto honest person like Marinaro to comply with what amounts to a legal mugging when his property rights and livelihood are threatened. Police may pursue Marinaro and use whatever "necessary force" is required to force him to play nice. All laws are coercive and backed by the police power of the state. To be fair, being coercive doesn't make a law bad. We all support coercive laws against rape and murder, traffic laws and laws forcing parties to a voluntary agreement to honor the contract. But at the end of the day, among the primary duties of government in the American republic are expanding liberty and preserving and protecting individual freedom. Sometimes that involves the trade-offs between the activities of one person and another, which is why we ought to test every new law limiting freedom with, among others, this question: Just how far are we are willing to go in pursuing compliance? For now, Marinaro is taking his case through the courts, but what if he loses? What if he refuses to pay his fine to the city of Babbitt? What if the Minnesota Health Department ups the ante and unleashes its enforcers to collect its threatened $10,000 fine, just to make Marinaro an example of what happens when you dare mock Minnesota law? What if the state sends Switajewski out with orders to use whatever "necessary force" is required to make Marinaro comply with state orders and Marinaro boards up the windows at Tank's, bolts the doors and points Switajewski to a short pier where he can take a long walk? What if the state orders in the State Patrol or the feds call up the ATF? Boarding up a building and creating an armed stand-off with duly authorized police would be a significantly higher of level of resistance to the smoking ban than hosting Theater Night. Nonetheless, when policy-makers formulate laws, regardless of how trivial or significant, those laws are equally backed up by the threat of imprisonment and violence. The point is just this: When chipping away at property rights and destroying people's livelihoods to satisfy the whim of the majority, policy-makers ought to remember that they get away with it only because they have a monopoly on force. If push comes to shove, ought not the objective of the law justify the use of "necessary force"? Is preventing people from voluntarily having a smoke with their burgers and beer worth unholstering weapons over? Is it worth risking lives over? How about saving your livelihood or preventing your property from being legislated to virtually worthless? Is that worth fighting over? Or should Mariano just shut up and drink the hemlock? Banning smoking in privately owned bars and restaurants is one of those cases where a little "gun control" — controlling the use of state police power supporting the whims of a majority — might not be such a bad idea. Maybe there ought to be a place for bad theater in Minnesota, after all. Craig Westover is a contributing columnist to the Pioneer Press Opinion page and a senior policy fellow at the Minnesota Free Market Institute (www.mnfmi.org). His e-mail address is \n This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . This commentary originally appeared in the St. Paul Pioneer Press Thursday, April 24, 2008. |
