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DAPL decision further diminishes rule of law

Sunday’s decision by the Army Corps of Engineers not to grant an easement for the Dakota Access oil pipeline is another sign that government is losing respect for the rule of law. Instead, more and more the federal government acts out of political expediency.

The pipeline developers followed the law and followed proper procedure set forth by government. Reasoned protesters still opted to speak up in opposition to it (albeit they couldn’t be bothered much to speak in opposition when it was specifically solicited in the aforementioned process). Those North Dakota protesters were then joined by swarms of paid rioters, who quickly set a violent tone. A phony narrative was disseminated that national media was all too happy to spread. Out-of-work celebrities joined in based on the phony narrative, and the whole affair turned into a spectacle.

If rule of law were still a concern, the Corps would have issued the easement. Instead, this decision  is a surrender to violent rioters, a message that no law need be respected it if isn’t politically correct and if opponents to the law are violent enough. Yes, the current administration is hostile to the energy industry, to the private sector in general and to the concept of rule of law overall. That’s what’s really  happening here – an administration in its final weeks throwing a bone to the radical left. If hundreds of rioters were espousing the end of the Affordable Care Act, they’d have long since been hauled off in handcuffs.

The most dangerous threat from the degradation of rule of law is that once it’s accepted as a norm, it will only get worse. What other laws will the federal government choose to ignore in the future? Who else will do everything right by law only to be foiled because an opponent is part of a privileged class or has the ear of government? How can the legal system justify that the private sector must obey the rule of law while the public sector does not.

For eight years now, lawlessness has become far too palatable at the national level. While that could be corrected in the years ahead, it could also begin to permeate state and local government everywhere. When does it end? When does mob rule entirely subvert law?

We’ll see in the years ahead. But if the Corps decision is any sign, the rule of law is now a terrorist target.

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