America’s unenforced vice laws existed because all classes wanted official morality preserved

Evidence

Nobody planned or intended what we have called the Victorian compromise. It simply happened. It happened because many men (and some women) were unable or unwilling to live a respectable bourgeois life every day and every hour. There was a tremendous underground demand for gambling, drink, risqué theater, pornography, and all forms of nonmarital sex. Yet, outright legalization was impossible. High-​minded people opposed it. And even many low-​minded people preferred a system of don’t ask, don’t tell. It was unthinkable to abandon traditional morality officially. Vice in the nineteenth century was a little bit like speeding on the highway today: almost everybody violates, from time to time, but even violators believe that laws against speeding are necessary. Without them, some drivers would go wild, and there might be chaos on the highways. — Lawrence M. Friedman, A History of American Law, 3335

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the ‘Victorian compromise’ concept clearly with the highway-speeding analogy as a memorable explanatory device.
• XREF: Connects to the polyad’s interest in how law relates to social norms — enforceability gap between statutory law and lived morality. — connects to: Even unenforceable vice laws retained real deterrent bite through selective enforcement — Lawrence M. Friedman, A History of American Law, 3360; Severing law from embodied moral tradition makes state force its sole authority — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular:…, 1155; Nineteenth-century vice laws against adultery went largely unenforced in practice — Lawrence M. Friedman and Grant M. Hayden, American Law: An Introduction, 817

Broader Connections

• Nineteenth-century vice laws against adultery went largely unenforced in practice #corroborates (0.85) — Lawrence M. Friedman and Grant M. Hayden, American Law, 817
• Even unenforceable vice laws retained real deterrent bite through selective enforcement #expands (0.82) — Lawrence M. Friedman, A History of American Law, 3360
• Severing law from embodied moral tradition makes state force its sole authority #complicates (0.72) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 1155