Obama misguided on legal, ethical standards

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Recently, President Barack Obama urged religious leaders to support his health care plan. He invoked a moral and ethical standard.

He stated, "These are all fabrications that have been put out there in order to discourage people from meeting what I consider to be a core ethical and moral obligation: that is that we look out for one another, that I am my brother's keeper, I am my sister's keeper. In the wealthiest nation on earth right now, we are neglecting to live up to that call."

The president is so wrong. The extreme danger of his words will shake the very foundation of our republic.

When our government decides on a moral and ethical standard for one another by invoking religious standards, the death of our nation and the principles upon which we are founded are clearly at hand. The irony of the president invoking a moral imperative in light of his stance on abortion is merely one message in a long line of ironies of a group of leaders who have no idea what moral or ethical means.

Unfortunately, many leaders have the mistaken impression that a legal standard is a moral and ethical standard. The danger comes when a politician invokes a moral and ethical standard and then makes it a legal standard.

Legal standards are not, by definition, also ethical. They may be, but the standards are different.

Legal standards are not necessarily moral.

The role of government is very clearly spelled out in the Constitution. Since members of Congress have difficulty reading bills, perhaps Obama and Congress have not yet read the Constitution. Let me assist.

The Preamble states, "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Prosperity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of America."

The First Amendment to the Constitution is equally clear that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peacefully to assemble, and to petition the Government for redress of grievances."

The 10th Amendment to the Constitution states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved for the States respectively, or to the people."

I wholeheartedly agree with the president that I have a moral and ethical obligation to look out for by brothers, sisters and neighbors. My obligation, however, is a religious one and not a legislated one.

When a society taxes people to redistribute income, the legal issues of taxation remove critical incentives on both the recipient of the tax as well as the recipient of the benefit. What Obama is proposing is actually cruel to our citizens most in need rather than helpful.

If you examine the history of entitlement programs, you will quickly notice that the lot of the people "helped" has actually deteriorated in most instances.

Providing subsidies to people frequently has the unintended consequence of making them dependent. The dependency in many cases usurps one's freedoms as individuals fear opposing those providing the entitlement.

For religious leaders, I strongly urge caution. Failure in the pulpit should not guide us into a religious submission to our government. We, as people of faith, must constantly remind one another of our personal responsibilities to help our brothers and sisters.

Faith can never be mandated. Charity cannot be mandated.

Love is in the heart and not in the wallet. Taxation is not charitable. I feel good when I help others. I do not feel so good when I am taxed. Taxation builds resentment and waste.

Should we as people of faith hear the president's words as a danger to religion, then I invoke all of us to do our faithful responsibility, and that is to care for others, to volunteer, to become our brother's keeper. That is our faithful responsibility. It is not my legislated responsibility.

Use the reality of our current laws to help you understand the danger of the president's words. You cannot invoke a moral and ethical standard and support abortion, freedom of choice and death panels.

In my faith, I try to live by a triangle of caring, which is: "To have faith is to trust. To trust is to believe. To believe is to have faith." Nowhere in this triangle is the word "legislate."
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Frank Ryan is a certified public accountant who specializes in corporate restructuring and lectures on ethics for the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. He is on the boards of three publicly traded companies