abstract: What exactly is a hate crime? (Some of us believe that since assault and murder are already illegal, we have all the legislation we need.)

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by Christopher Alexion

Statism is a religion, and its copious religious baggage includes a system of sacraments--particularly the sacrament of penance. In observation of this rite, the faithful confess their sins to their congressman (the vicar of their savior), who promptly absolves them of all responsibility and recommends legislation to correct the problem.

The authority of this nifty sacramental system is now being exercised in the area of hate. If you harbor a racist or bigot in your heart, Congress, always on top of the situation, has the answer: make hate a Federal offense. Well, not hate exactly, but hate crimes.

Yet already the crusade is getting off to a bad start. What exactly is a hate crime? (Some of us believe that since assault and murder are already illegal, we have all the legislation we need.) But though it is crucial for the supporters of this legislation to clearly and unambiguously define their terms, they seem to have dropped the ball. And it's hard to blame them. They've put themselves in a tight position, since they are forced to make a distinction, not between two different crimes, but between two identical crimes committed with different motives.

The problem of defining a hate crime is not only difficult but can lead to the ridiculous. One example would be the argument that "hate crimes are indeed different from all other crimes" because "they marginalize, they dehumanize, they intimidate." Now this, of course, makes perfect sense; an ordinary mugger would never dream of intimidating his victim. Nor does rape dehumanize. Only hate crimes do that. More seriously, though, this attempt at a definition is so poor that we might as well say that hate crimes are different because they magnetize, they dehydrate, and they intoxicate.

The problem with hate crimes legislation, however, is not merely one of definition. It involves the nature of law itself. Law is based on a distinction between sins and crimes. Sins, obviously, are those actions which are wrong or immoral. Theft, murder, pride, and covetousness are all examples of sins--they are wrong. Some of these sins, such as theft and murder, are also crimes--they are not only wrong but punishable by civil law. But we have to remember that while all crimes are sins, not all sins are crimes.

So while most of us would agree that hatred of innocent people is wrong, we ought to pause and ask why hatred is a crime. Why is this subjective feeling outlawed while lust and pride are passed over? What is so special about hate that it can make one murder more of a murder than another?

At this point hate crimes legislation moves from illogical to dangerous. Once we single out "hate" as an entity worth punishing, we are no longer punishing a murderer merely for murder, but also for the hatred that motivated his murder. And once we begin to punish his motives, we can punish him for his motives even before he commits a crime.

This seems to be what the advocates of hate crimes legislation mean when they talk about "preventing" hate crimes. This is only consistent. Once we commit ourselves to the eradication of hate, we must eradicate even those expressions of hate that do not involve the usual kind of criminal activity. That's the idea behind the support of bans on "hate speech": usually you would have the right to speak your mind, but if your speech contains hatred, you're breaking the law.

Yet this notion destroys not only the freedom of speech but religious freedom as well. Once you grant the civil magistrate the power to declare some speech a crime, then, by implication, there is no logical barrier to his declaring certain religious speech a crime. Religious speech is a subset of free speech, and when we give the state jurisdiction over the latter, can we reasonably withhold the former?

The upshot is that we're left with a sham religious freedom: we are free to believe and proclaim anything we want, but only if it's approved by the government. Once the "experts" rule the expression of any particular doctrine to be "hate speech," an otherwise law-abiding American could be in serious trouble. Christianity, with its strong emphasis on objective morality and absolute truth, would be a prime target.

But Patrick Henry wanted to preserve all free speech, and that's why he fought for a Federal Bill of Rights. He held that the free (though peaceful) exercise of religion was so important that no one, not even the Congress, could abridge it. He wanted to guard against illogical notions of "hate crimes."

But the proponents of such laws don't seem to understand the First Amendment very well. It's an odd sort of Constitutional interpretation, after all, that translates "Congress shall make no law" as "Congress shall make a law."

Christopher Alexion is a homeschooled high school senior with interests in apologetics, philosophy, and politics. He pursues these interests through writing, and several of his articles have appeared on the Internet. He lives in New Castle, Delaware.

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