of the ceaseless competition to find ever more stringent restrictionsrnto place upon the smoker, to go as far as possible inrnthe direction of outright prohibition without actually banningrneither the substance or its use. And while amazed at thernfrankness with which this generation discusses condoms andrn”safe sex,” the time-traveler would also note the presumptionrnthat virtually any unprotected extramarital sex is not merely immoral,rnbut a likely ticket to plague and painful death.rnEverything would indicate the triumph of a severely puritanrnethic, based on the ideas of the sinfulness of pleasure, the collectivernenforcement of virtue, and the certainty that pleasurernleads to severe punishment, if not in hell flames then in thernhospital wards treating cancer, heart disease, or AIDS. Moreover,rnpuritan attitudes and assumptions are by no means confinedrnto rubes and backwoodsmen, but have become the orthodoxyrnof educated elites. Among the medical profession, forrnexample, the visitor from the past would find a radical reversalrnof the opinions of his own day. While modern doctors have arnwidespread and well-founded awareness of the vast healthrnbenefits of occasional wine-drinking, virtually none dares advocaternso pernicious a policy, which would blatantly flout thernideology of temperance. The same doctors know that for anrnaging community with high cancer rates, the effective relief ofrnpain is to be found only in the extensive use of heroin and morphine,rnas in every advanced European nation today and in thernAmerica of bygone days; but the modern profession refuses tornoffer the necessary pain relief in sufficient quantities becausernof the irrational fear of drugs in any guise. Nor will it campaignrnfor governments to relax their savage and cruel prohibitions onrnsuch treatment or in any way challenge the self-appointedrnmedical expertise of the drug enforcement bureaucrats. Whilernneither the doctors nor the bureaucrats actually declare thatrnagony is a necessary trial sent by God, their practical conclusionsrnare indistinguishable from the puritan presumption.rnMulling over his distressing observations, the man fromrnthe 1940’s would have no doubt that America had experiencedrna religious and moral “Great Awakening” akin tornthose of the previous century and had almost certainly replacedrnits republican government with a form of theocracy.rnThis would explain the widespread erotophobia, the Comstockery,rnthe obsession with Temperance, and even the foodrnfaddery, which has so often coincided with waves of evangelicalrnreformism. (At least the mid-Victorian revivals bequeathedrnus the pleasant legacies of graham crackers and Kellogg’s cereals.)rnOur visitor’s conclusions would be quite logical, and ofrncourse they would be utterly wrong. The would-be mullahs ofrntelevangelism have contributed far less to the rise of the NewrnPuritanism than have mainstream and relatively liberal groups,rngenerally acting in the name of “social responsibility” and “therncommunity” and virtually never invoking any supernatural orrnindeed moral basis for their policies.rnThe paradox deserves emphasis, as does the contrast withrnmost of recorded history. One of the most plentiful sourcesrnavailable to historians of almost any previous society is thernrecord of attempts to suppress vice and immorality, variouslyrndefined but almost always placed in some religious or supernaturalrncontext. In the English-speaking world, right up to thernlate 18th century, most citizens were subject to the complexrnnetwork of church courts, which had wide powers over questionsrnof both property and morality. Apart from the “obvious”rnvices such as incest, sodomy, fornication, and adultery, churchrncourts dealt with an amazing range of what we would considerrnpurely private vices or problems, including drunkenness,rnmasturbation, swearing. Sabbath-breaking, and religious dissidence.rnCases might involve disputes over matters as intimaternas a spouse failing to fulfill his or her sexual obligations orrnchildren being born a suspiciously short time after wedlock.rn1/1/^ explicitly religiousrny f ^ warrants (‘ThernBible says it’s wrong’), prohibitions havernhad to be justified in utilitarian termsrnthat become ever more questionable asrndefinitions of ‘harm’ are stretched torntheir limits and beyond.rnIn 17th-century England or colonial America, such intrusionsrncould readily be justified by the sanction of religion. If arngiven societ)’ was attempting to live up to the role of God’s newrnIsrael, then it was justihable to enforce appropriate standards onrnevery individual in that community. It was obligatory for everyrnneighbor to assist in that effort by whatever means necessary,rnincluding what we would describe as eavesdropping or sheerrnprying. Though justified in metaphysical terms, moral enforcementrnalso had a utilitarian component, in that the moralrnand natural laws reinforced one another. A society that permittedrnvice or immorality laid itself open to divine wrath in thernform of plague, famine, war, or climatic disaster: the ByzantinernEmperor Justinian prohibited homosexuality on the logicalrngrounds that the behavior was well known to incite earthquakes.rnWhatever we may think about such a worldview andrnits consequences, it did at least have the virtues of clarity andrnconsistency, and there was a straightforward answer to thernquestion of why certain prohibitions were sought or enforced.rnGod willed it and expressed His views clearly through both HisrnScriptures and the traditions of His church.rnIn the last decade, by contrast, the overtly cited justificationsrnfor control and prohibition have invariably stressed the utilitarianrnelement of the argument, citing the real or imaginedrnharm of the behavior in question, while the religious foundationsrnof the movement have slipped into the background.rnThis appears to be a thoroughly secularized puritanism. In thernearly I980’s, the foci of concern involved behavior in whichrnthere was at least arguably an element of harm and public danger,rndrunk driving being the most conspicuous example.rnMADD (“Mothers Against Drunk Driving”) has been one ofrnthe most effective pressure groups in modern American history,rnand its appeal is obvious: opposing the group or the measuresrnit advocates invites the question of whether the critic is eitherrnhostile to bereaved mothers or supportive of drunk drivers,rnscarcely a tenable rhetorical position.rnDrunk driving unquestionably can cause real social harmrnand physical damage, and the consensus on this issue providesrnJULY 1994/21rnrnrn