If substantial numbers of people break a law, then it is a bad law.

This depends on how you define things like "substantial" and "large numbers." Things like speed limits, traffic lights, and stop signs get violated every day.

This doesn't mean that we should just let people drive however they want through school zones.

I agree with Cobra. I try to go with the spirit of a claim rather than be anal, but as far is "large numbers", I'm not sure. A lot of people steal, but it's still a good law (theft being illegal).

This claim is comically vague.

CB: If lots and lots of people are speeding through a particular stretch of road, then the speed limit on that road is artificially low. The proper way to set a speed limit is to post no speed limit, then measure how fast the bulk of traffic moves (e.g. 90%) and set the speed limit at that point. If the speed limit is lower than that — or higher than that, for that matter — then that particular speed limit is a bad law.

Similarly, the popularity of P2P is a huge red flag that something is terribly awry with copyright law. That doesn't mean that copyright law should be abolished, just that the current copyright law is a bad law.

And, returning to immigration, the fact that a substantial percentage of the American population is illegal immigrants from Mexico means that there isn't enough legal immigration from Mexico. It specifically does not mean that the fences are too short or there aren't enough roving nutjobs with guns. The yearly immigration quotas are broken. Considering that the very existence of yearly immigration quotas was conceived of due to racist and anti-immigrant bias, having any quota is probably a bad law, but at the very least the current quotas are definitely a bad law.

despite the vagueness of the wording -- significant numbers, indeed -- the spirit of this claim is clear to me. Another thign to consider is that the punishment for breaking a law is generally construed as a part of that law; if most people speed, perhaps the punishment is too lenient. Also, enforcement -- if it isn't worth enforcing ht elaw, it's a bad law, and speeding is not enforced uniformly or enough to dissuade people.

Re: speeding, i'm not sure that example is quite corect -- sometimes the law is one of safety; people might go around a curve very fast, in Chronos' example, and have the limit set higher than is actually safe. But if those numebrs are often set lower than they need to be, people will notice -- and then stop heeding those signs, making the warnings less useful than if they were all posted accurately. thus, a bad law.

again, it doesn't mean we should throw out every law that gets boken a lot; but reword it so tha tit won't, or acknowledge that society has moved on since that law was a relevant concern.

Not that every oft-broken law should be repealed. that would lead, sadly, to much abuse.

Ooh, a Slashdot commenter has a nice bit to say in the context of copyright law:

[E]lected politicians are supposed to decide what is legal and what not. But by deciding that "everything" is illegal, they've efficiently handed the keys over to RIAA et al.

"Everyone" is very slightly pushing it, but it's not far from the truth. I was at a lecture about IT and law, and the professor asked those people who have ever willingly broken copyright-law to raise a hand. Literally 95% of all hands went up. IT-students have more reason and more expertise, so may be slightly over-represented, but I'm willing to bet that 95% of current 25-year-olds are guilty of breaking copyright-law at least once in the last year.

(Typos corrected.)

If that's not "substantial numbers", I don't know what is.

And another Slashdotter suggested:

We need to send someone to Congress and have them speak when it's someone's birthday. Then we have that guy do a little sing-a-long with all of the congressmen. Get them all to sing their colleague "Happy Birthday".

Maybe then it will sink in.

(Typos and punctuation corrected.)

No, the mob is not always right about what's good for them

Even if the law is coming from the right place, it's still a bad law because it's not actually stopping people from doing the prohibited activity.

A law that says "people who do such-and-such are very naughty and oughtn't do that" doesn't actually accomplish anything if people ignore the law and do such-and-such regardless — even if such-and-such really is very naughty.

"bad" doesn't have to mean "evil" Billy m'boy. It can also mean "ineffective".

Twer I a cop I would think gross speeders should get tickets, even if they will do it again. Pays for the roads they ruin, eh?

Wait a minute, twer I me!

It's true that legislating a speed limit doesn't really slow people down. Neither do speed bumps.

Probably the best way is to make the road in question look slower, but narrowing it and planting trees along the edges. That tends to produce a considerable reduction in speed.

If it has to be done by legislation though I'd be in favor of lifting the speed limits but imposing severe and automatic penalties against people who cause collisions. Perhaps even for people who are involved in collisions caused by somebody else since that takes away the need to prove whoes fault something is.

errata: s/but narrowing/by narrowing/

Oregon is a no fault state, which I think means everyone gets their insurance fucked up if they are hit. And I resent that greatly since I am a cautiou and respectful driver, and in 11 years I have never cause any kind of accident.

Even though I leave off the last letter of many words . . .