Andrew Sullivan has posted a partial response to my remarks regarding Rick Santorum. Part of his response makes me think that I was insufficiently clear earlier. To clarify a few points: 1) Sullivan asserted that Santorum wanted to see sodomy laws enforced. I said that there was no evidence for that contention. I wasn’t saying that it’s okay not to enforce laws on the books. 2) Nor did I comment on whether Santorum was right to deny the existence of a moral principle of sexual freedom on which governments may not transgress. I have not arrived at a solid conclusion on this subject, frankly, but I am inclined to think that any such right to sexual freedom cannot be absolute. I don’t think it is unjust for governments to ban prostitution or consensual adult incest, for example, and I would think that most opponents of anti-sodomy laws would want to rest their argument on a principle that would not imply that it is unjust. 3) I would respond to Sullivan’s charge that I contradicted myself in my earlier remarks, but I don’t understand what the alleged contradiction is. I do not “concede” that Santorum supports laws against sodomy; I assert it, I proclaim it, I shout it from the rooftops.
Sullivan also says that I, along with other conservatives who oppose sodomy laws, am at fault for not writing against those laws “except deep in a defense of someone” like Santorum. I think Sullivan has a good point here. All I can say in my defense is that it does seem to me that the facts that these laws are going away and are rarely enforced really do mitigate the urgency of arguing against them. But I recognize that that’s not a very good defense.
Finally, Sullivan expresses his disgust with the views he attributes to a hypothetical “genteel conservative.” Those views are certainly not my own (and I doubt that they are the views of many conservatives).