I held positions in all three Reagan campaigns and was a strong supporter. Reagan was not the hard mean man that revisionist like Buchanan try to paint him to be.
Reagan was the epitome of compassion. In person the compassion and strong determination to make peoples' lives better was overwhelmingly apparent.
Those who know him only from history don't have the faintest clue about the man.
Reagan never let his 'compassion', as you call it, get in the way of his respect for the law, let alone doing what he knew was right. Your appropriation of him here is obscene.
I know a little about the guy, since he was also my governor for 8 years.