John Marshall was an early chief justice of the supreme Court, so it is fitting that the John Marshal Elementary School on Long Island should be perhaps the first primary school in America to recognize the legal hazards involved in children's art, as we know, is usually made on paper. At the John Marshall Elementary School, as in every other school in America, children's art is tacked to the wall. Words and letters are also tacked up for the children to see. The law in New York, you may be surprised to learn, does not permit this, or at least not much of it. The state fire code actually addresses the public hazard explicitly: "Student art displays ... must be kept at least two feet from ceiling, 10 feet from exits which means any door and ... not exceed 20% of the wall surface."

The issue came up during a Halloween party in 1993. The local fire chief was there dressed as Officer MacGruff, "the police dog who promotes safety and drug awareness." As a diligent officer of the law, he noticed all the Halloween decorations and student art that had been attached to the wall. Within days, Office MacGruff had done his duty. The school, according to one observer, now looked "about as inviting as a bomb shelter." All the art was gone. The school superintendent, having been accused of permitting a legal violation, suggested that he was aware of the law all along but had used a rule of thumb "on how much to decorate." Liz Skinner, a first grade teacher, was confused: "The essence of primary education is that children show pride in their work." No one had ever heard of fire cause by children's art, but there was a law just to make sure. So the art came down.

"The characteristic complaint of our time seems to be not that government provides no reason," said former justice William Brennan, "but that its reasons often seem remote from human beings who must live with the consequences." Government acts like some extraterrestrial power, not an institution that exists to serve us. Its actions have an arbitrary quality: It almost never deals with real-life problems in a way that reflects an understanding of the situation.

Who are the experts of government? Even an abstract observation of Congress and state legislatures reveals that lawyers and judicial politicians make up the majority of America's law making institutions. Lawyers pass laws for self protection and to insure an ever increasing and lucrative source of income for an inept legal monopoly. America is under siege by laws and regulations, filled with legalese, that can only be understood by lawyers, and victimized by unscrupulous judges that exercise perverted discretion. Think before voting another lawyer into public office.

For more information read:

The Death of Common Sense - How Law is Suffocating America, by Philip K. Howard. Published by Random House, Inc. New York