The point has probably best been made in a speech by Sir Thomas More, written by playwright Robert Bolt, in A Man for All Seasons. More turns to his former confidant Will Roper who has become a vigilante in the name of justice and asks:

And when the last law was cut down and the devil turned around on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?

This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast – man's laws, not God's – and if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think that you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?

www.cesr.org/iraq