[Cboldt]

The screed is nothing more than an appeal to the validity and superiority of positive law. I submit that there is at least a hypothetical positive low (and probably a REAL one) that any given person will reject. The basis for rejection will vary, maybe the law is picayune (who doesn't drive a little over the speed limit?), or it may be serious (cake bakers refusing to take a homosexual's order for a wedding cake), but positive law is not as superior as it claims or desires to be.

Blackstone had quite a bit to say about positive law, and the basis for its validity. When positive law deviates from the principles that give it force, then positive law loses its claim to "moral high ground."

And it only has its practitioners (the judges, mostly) to blame.

[John Valentine]

Indeed. There’s a pithy treatise on this subject titled “Law. Liberty and Morality” by H.L.A. Hart based on a series of lectures he gave at Stanford some decades ago. If you can find a copy, it’s worth a read.