In a recent letter to the editor, the author of “The right vs. the law (5/26)” compared illegal immigrants to the early leaders of the church.
He observed the early church members violated the law to practice polygamy and those men were still doing what was right, therefore there are cases when it isn’t wrong to break the law.
This is all true. But then he implies by this same reasoning, illegal immigrants may not be doing something wrong.
This is a false analogy, because the two situations are not the same in the relevant way.
What made the church leaders actions permissible was they were directly commanded by God to practice polygamy.
Having to choose between the law of God and the law of man, they wisely chose to follow the higher authority.
However, illegal immigrants are not commanded by God to sneak into the United States, therefore they have no such conflict between commandments.
There may be other grounds for saying violating immigration laws is not morally wrong, but the comparison to polygamy fails.
Colin Mann
Hillsboro, Ore.
