A libertarian-leaning friend of mine once made an illuminating comment. He said, more or less, "The trouble with you Christian Right types is, you just want to impose your own morality on everybody else, but all I want to do is just make sure you can't di rectly harm another person." His argument, of course, is commonplace, as if (a) imposition of morality were intrinsically bad, and (b) only the so-called Christian Right were trying to do it.

There is, however, a twofold problem. Imposition of morality is not only desirable, but unavoidable under the rule of law, and therefore, the only difference among the various political groups is which moral system they wish to see imposed.

To understand the first point, consider what a law is. A law may be reasonably defined as a restriction or prescription on behavior (actually these are equivalent, but never mind). It either tells you what you can't do (4-wheel across the neighbor's lawn) or what you must do (fork over a third of your cash to Uncle Sam). Now you may not agree with the law, but by residing in its jurisdiction, you are compelled to obey it; that is, to behave as if you believe the law is right and good.

For example, we have laws against assault. Some people see nothing wrong with beating people up and may enjoy it immensely. Our laws, though, presume that people have a right not to be beaten up; that is, that assault is wrong. As far as actions go, the l aw imposes that moral belief on everyone, and most people agree that this is a good thing.

Of course, some governments go much further. Communist states often force their subjects to profess belief in specified moral systems. They may also try to regulate thoughts along with behavior, by such means as propaganda, peer pressure (like the Hitler Jugend, Communism and fascism being two sides of the same coin), banning religion, etc.

But any system of laws imposes morality on behavior. Even if one argues that laws are not derived from morals (and I disagree), their effects would be exactly the same as if they were.

This leads to the second point. If every legal system imposes morality, then the Right's detractors (except for anarchists) must want to impose morality themselves, even as they shrilly denounce the Right for that very reason. It's like discussing the evi l of technology over e-mail.

One doesn't even need the theory, in fact. The same folks who attack the Christian Coalition are often perfectly happy to make Americans hire gays against their will, to confiscate their property to save a few rodents, to abort their daughters' babies wit hout even letting them know, to ban smoking, to subject them to "sensitivity training," even to force them to say "woman" instead of "girl." For such people to blast the Right for "imposing its own morality on people" is deliciously ironic, to say the lea st.

All of this should demonstrate that the argument against imposing morality on people is beside the point, as the only way to avoid imposing morality is to abandon the rule of law, which virtually no one (at least no sane person) wants to do. Even the Libe rtarian Party would impose morality on actions, by requiring as it does that no one directly harm an innocent person.

Thus, the real debate is over which morals to impose and why, and this debate must be argued case-by-case. If, for instance, you think pot ought to be legal, then marshal your evidence and present it, but don't tell your opponent, "You're wrong because ba nning drugs means imposing your morality on people." Unless you're an anarchist, you will have shot yourself in the foot.

(A related error is to say, "My position is better because it gives people more freedom." Unless you explain why people ought to have whatever specific freedom you're proposing (like, say, the freedom to burn the flag), I can walk up and say, "I think peo ple ought to be free to burn down buildings," and by your argument, I'll be right, as my position will be even better than yours.)

When I pointed all of this out to my libertarian friend, he saw my point. The subject of right and wrong as it relates to society and law, and of the source of moral convictions, can be intimidating in its depth. Nonetheless, we must face it honestly, and do away with the chimera of arguing against the imposition of morality.

John Keisling, a card-carrying Christian Coalition member, believes cantaloupe to be evil. He is a mathematics Ph. D. candidate whose column appears Wednesdays.