Editorials

Thank goodness for moral outrage

March 26, 2011 12:00 AM

As the General Assembly burned up taxpayer dollars wrangling over a difficult budget, we can be thankful one measure that would have been both expensive and damaging to the state didn't get much traction in this year's session.

Senate Bill 6 died under the weight of its own meanness and irrationality, after citizens protested loud and long to make that clear to lawmakers.

The bill, a copycat of legislation passed in Arizona last year, called for illegal aliens to be found guilty of trespassing simply for being in Kentucky.

Thousands of Kentuckians pointed out that such a law, if enforced, would pack the state's prisons at great cost with people who would ordinarily be working, supporting their families, paying taxes and generally contributing to the economy.

The Department of Corrections, which knows all too well what it costs to lock up people, said the fiscal impact of the bill would be "significant."

Now, Arizona is realizing the error of its ways. Last week, the Republican-controlled Senate, which gave rise to the original bill, rejected five anti-immigration measures in one day.

The about-face came after 60 top business executives signed a letter laying out the negative economic consequences of the anti-immigration campaign, such as canceled contracts, boycotts and a decline in tourism.

Kentucky dodged that particular impact because citizens were so morally outraged by the measure that their elective representatives backed down. It's certainly possible that, without such protests, the General Assembly would have pandered happily on and passed this bill, with disastrous results.

So, the lesson here is to beware of copycat legislation on hot-button issues.

Interfering with what adults do in their bedrooms and the rights of people who aren't endangering others, micromanaging curriculum and thumbing our collective nose in ways sure to be reversed by federal courts are all examples of bad ideas that should be left to die on their home soil.

Kentucky has enough problems; we don't need to import them.

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