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The most important issue is not equal treatment under the law...

I disagree, and really, so do you. You mentioned exceptions of TV celebrities and one Congressman (one of the few who wasn't smart enough not to get caught) via unequal application of the law...exactly what I said should not be done. Such exceptions are what jaundice the rest of us towards the application of the law.

It would seem to me that equal and consistent application of the law would actually reinforce your desire for the protection of private property rights. They are not mutually exclusive goals. As to Mr. Jefferson, I don't think he's dodged the bullet yet.

I think the problem isn’t so much the unequal application of the law, but that there are too many damned laws on the books in the first place.

Good God, there isn’t ANY aspect of our lives now that isn’t subject to some dim-witted “code” someplace, and THAT fosters contempt for even the appropriate laws every society does need.

What I wouldn’t give for them to just leave us the hell alone...

Regards,

James Madison, one of the three authors of The Federalist Papers, is famously quoted as saying that if men were angels, no government would be necessary. However, Madison went on to state that were angels to govern men, there would be no need to have controls to restrain the power of government. Because we are governed by men, the need for restraints exists on both private and public behavior. The Founders' solution for such problems was to set up a tripartite form of government, provide for a Bill of Rights, limit Federal government power severely (10th Amendment), and state government power moderately (no barriers to interstate trade, no coinage of money, no separate treaties with foreign nations, etc.). The Bill of Rights went beyond existing Anglo-American common law restraints on government power by expressly forbidding such abuses as restraint on political or religious speech, cruel and unusual punishment, or suspension of habeas corpus on the part of the Federal government. As a rule, state constitutions enshrined similar safeguards.

The history of this nation's declension from the high ideals of the Founders is well known. If we look at the transactions for which the Amish have been fined in Wisconsin and Iowa, they are largely personal decisions, such as not wearing orange when hunting on their own private property and not on public land. These actions are apparently tolerated in Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, where the Amish are long established. One poster stated that the reason for the harassment is due to ancient feuds with the "Hochdeutsch" in the Upper Midwest, as opposed to the Mennonite, Scots-Irish and white Catholic background of their neighbors in the lower Northern states where the Amish have been long established. This may be true. There is a tradition of hostility toward politically powerless minority religions that has popped up at different times since the mid-19th Century, as evidenced by the harassment of Mormon settlements in the Midwest and the Know Nothing movement against Catholic immigrants in the Northeast. Jehovah's Witnesses were the subject of ill treatment during the World Wars on account of their refusal to join the military or show homage to national symbols like the U.S. flag. Especially in the case of the Mormons, government officials, as high ranking as governors, sanctioned legal harassment and extralegal terrorism.

Eliminating disparity of treatment is an ideal that has rarely been achieved, whether at the local, state, or Federal level. All too often, top local officials become Boss Hogg or his urban or minority equivalent, and some of these Boss Hoggs to state or Federal government leadership. This has been the case since the founding of the republic. For example, Andrew Jackson used the spoils system to benefit his cronies and achieved some of his goals, such as defunding the Second Bank of the United States, outside of the legislative process. Restraining government power has been difficult to achieve as well, but there was greater success at it before the rise of modern liberalism. Until the New Deal, we had very limited restraints on trade and property rights at the Federal level and only mild ones, such as licensing requirements for physicians, at the state level. A major initial goal of the post-World War II government power. It was obviously unsuccessful in this area, and many who think of themselves as conservatives, have made their peace with Leviathan.

While fairness may be desirable, limitations on government power at all levels is more so. Let the Amish and others live at peace with society in general, if they desire to live peaceably.