Reflections on Moral Legislation from the Perspective of Legal Philosophy

In recent years, there has been a serious phenomenon of moral anomie in the context of social transformation, especially with the outbreak of a series of hot ethical events or cases, a vigorous “moral defense war” has begun. One of the calls for revitalizing morality through legislation is particularly noteworthy, but the key issue is whether the legislation really makes people more moral. In the face of morally diverse life practices, legislation should abide by the basic principle that people should not be forced to do what they can not do in fact by means of coercion, which will not make people more moral, but will lead to moral autocracy or tyranny. On the premise of respect for diversified values, moral legislation can adopt equal emphasis on encouragement and enforcement to guide people to abandon evil and promote good from different angles. Morality is a kind of reflective good in nature, which determines the necessary limits of moral legislation. Only by consciously keeping the external behavior consistent with the moral requirements, and more importantly, internalizing the moral requirements in the mind, can one be a truly moral man.