The Sliding Scale of Morality and Law

1 Corinthians 10:12 For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves. But they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.

If our laws and our morals as a society are not grounded in something that does not change, then what we believe to be acceptable at one time will certainly change over time. Anyone can see this as they reflect on those activities that were prohibited years ago. It is the same concept when one hears that we should be led by the “first principles” when referring to the constitution of the United States. The founders of this country believed that if we strayed too far from these first principles, the state of the union would be in jeopardy. Equally, our Creator has dictated that if we stray from His First Principles, we too, as as society and individually, are in jeopardy.

Below is a listing of those state statutes that are repealed or were put into law years ago and are being completely ignored today:

Sunday Liquor Sales (MCL 436.2114 Selling, giving away, furnishing, or buying alcoholic liquor or spirits on Sunday): Just repealed for the want of more money. See my post on my other site here. It used to be restricted on Sunday morning from 2:00am to 12:00 noon.

Abortion: MCL 750.14 Administering drugs, etc., with intent to procure miscarriage—Any person who shall wilfully administer to any pregnant woman any medicine, drug, substance or thing whatever, or shall employ any instrument or other means whatever, with intent thereby to procure the miscarriage of any such woman, unless the same shall have been necessary to preserve the life of such woman, shall be guilty of a felony, and in case the death of such pregnant woman be thereby produced, the offense shall be deemed manslaughter.MCL 750.90g(b) That a live infant partially outside his or her mother is neither a fetus nor potential life, but is a person.

Adultery: MCL 750.30 Punishment—Any person who shall commit adultery shall be guilty of a felony; and when the crime is committed between a married woman and a man who is unmarried, the man shall be guilty of adultery, and liable to the same punishment.

Advertising relating to sexual diseases: MCL 750.34 A person who advertises ... the treating or curing of venereal diseases, the restoration of “lost manhood” or “lost vitality or vigor”, or advertises in any manner that he or she is a specialist in diseases of the sexual organs, or diseases caused by sexual vice or masturbation, or in any diseases of like cause, or shall advertise in any manner any medicine, drug, compound, appliance, or any means whatever whereby sexual diseases of men or women may be cured or relieved, or miscarriage or abortion produced, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for not more than 1 year or a fine of not more than $1,000.00.

Blasphemy: MCL 750.102 Any person who shall wilfully blaspheme the holy name of God, by cursing or contumeliously reproaching God, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.

Cursing and Swearing: MCL 750.103 Any person who has arrived at the age of discretion, who shall profanely curse or damn or swear by the name of God, Jesus Christ or the Holy Ghost, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor. No such prosecution shall be sustained unless it shall be commenced within 5 days after the commission of such offense.

Homosexuality/Sodomy: MCL 750.158 Any person who shall commit the abominable and detestable crime against nature either with mankind or with any animal shall be guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment in the state prison not more than 15 years, or if such person was at the time of the said offense a sexually delinquent person, may be punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for an indeterminate term, the minimum of which shall be 1 day and the maximum of which shall be life. MCL 750.159 In any prosecution for sodomy, it shall not be necessary to prove emission, and any sexual penetration, however slight, shall be deemed sufficient to complete the crime specified in the next preceding section.

Desertion of Spouse: MCL 750.161 (1) A person who deserts and abandons his or her spouse or deserts and abandons his or her children under 17 years of age, without providing necessary and proper shelter, food, care, and clothing for them, and a person who being of sufficient ability fails, neglects, or refuses to provide necessary and proper shelter, food, care, and clothing for his or her spouse or his or her children under 17 years of age, is guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment in a state correctional facility for not less than 1 year and not more than 3 years, or by imprisonment in the county jail for not less than 3 months and not more than 1 year.

Fortune Telling (repealed 1993): MCL 750.267-270 Repealed. 1993, Act 282, Eff. Apr. 1, 1994.
267 Fortune telling by cards, etc., for gain - Any person who shall pretend for money or gain, to predict future events by cards, tokens, trances, the inspection of the hands or the conformation of the skull of any person, mind reading so-called, or by consulting the movements of the heavenly bodies, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.

Gambling: MCL 750.301 Any person or his or her agent or employee who, directly or indirectly, takes, receives, or accepts from any person any money or valuable thing with the agreement, understanding or allegation that any money or valuable thing will be paid or delivered to any person where the payment or delivery is alleged to be or will be contingent upon the result of any race, contest, or game or upon the happening of any event not known by the parties to be certain, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for not more than 1 year or a fine of not more than $1,000.00.

Incest (repealed 1974 and 1999): MCL 750.333 Any person who is within the degree of consanguinity with another within which marriages are prohibited or declared by law to be incestuous and void...and shall marry such other person, or shall commit adultery or fornication with such other person, shall be guilt of a felony.

Lewd and lascivious cohabitation and gross lewdness: MCL 750.335 Any man or woman, not being married to each other, who lewdly and lasciviously associates and cohabits together, and any man or woman, married or unmarried, who is guilty of open and gross lewdness and lascivious behavior, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for not more than 1 year, or a fine of not more than $1,000.00. No prosecution shall be commenced under this section after 1 year from the time of committing the offense.

Women and children; improper language in presence: MCL 750.337 Any person who shall use any indecent, immoral, obscene, vulgar or insulting language in the presence or hearing of any woman or child shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.

Gross indecency; between male persons: MCL 750.338 Any male person who, in public or in private, commits or is a party to the commission of or procures or attempts to procure the commission by any male person of any act of gross indecency with another male person shall be guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than 5 years, or by a fine of not more than $2,500.00, or if such person was at the time of the said offense a sexually delinquent person, may be punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for an indeterminate term, the minimum of which shall be 1 day and the maximum of which shall be life.

Gross indecency; female persons: MCL 750.338a Any female person who, in public or in private, commits or is a party to the commission of, or any person who procures or attempts to procure the commission by any female person of any act of gross indecency with another female person shall be guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than 5 years, or by a fine of not more than $2,500.00, or if such person was at the time of the said offense a sexually delinquent person, may be punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for an indeterminate term, the minimum of which shall be 1 day and the maximum of which shall be life.

Gross indecency; between male and female persons: MCL 750.338b Any male person who, in public or in private, commits or is a party to the commission of any act of gross indecency with a female person shall be guilty of a felony, punishable as provided in this section. Any female person who, in public or in private, commits or is a party to the commission of any act of gross indecency with a male person shall be guilty of a felony punishable as provided in this section. Any person who procures or attempts to procure the commission of any act of gross indecency by and between any male person and any female person shall be guilty of a felony punishable as provided in this section. Any person convicted of a felony as provided in this section shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than 5 years, or by a fine of not more than $2,500.00, or if such person was at the time of the said offense a sexually delinquent person, may be punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for an indeterminate term, the minimum of which shall be 1 day and the maximum of which shall be life.

Obscene, sadistic, or masochistic literature; recording or image, penalty for sale, transmutation, or possession: MCL 750.343a Repealed. 1957, Act 265, Imd. Eff. June 13, 1957.
Any person who knowingly either sells, lends, gives away, distributes, shows or transmutes or offers either to sell, lend, give away, distribute, show or transmute, or advertise in any manner, or who otherwise knowingly offers for either loan, gift, sale or distribution, any obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy or indecent, sadistic or masochistic book magazine, pamphlet, newspaper, story paper, writing, paper, phonograph record, picture, drawing, photograph, motion picture film, figure, image, wire or tape recording or any written,printed or recorded matter of an indecent character which may or may not require mechanical or other means to be transmuted into auditory, visual or sensory representations of such character, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction shall be punished by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than 1 year or by a fine of not more than $1,000, or by both such fine and imprisonment. MCL 750.343b The test to be applied in cases under section 343a of this act shall not be whether sexual desires or sexually improper thoughts would be aroused in those comprising a particular segment of the community, the young, the immature or the highly prudish, or would leave another segment, the scientific or highly educated or the so-call worldly wise and sophisticated, indifferent and unmoved. But such test shall be the effect of the book, picture or other subject to complaint considered as a whole, not upon any particular class, but upon all those whom it is likely to reach, that is, its impact upon the average person in the community. The book, picture or other subject of complaint must be judged as a whole in its entire context, not by considering detached or separate portions only, and by the standards of common conscience of the community of the contemporary period of the violation charged.

Seduction: MCL 750.532 Any man who shall seduce and debauch any unmarried woman shall be guilty of a felony

Penal Code