“Compromise” is not a nasty word. In fact, compromise is the basis of a free society, yet far too many people fail to understand this.

A truly “free” society is one where one’s freedom to act is maximized within the law. In a free society, laws provide the guardrails so that someone else’s freedom doesn’t minimize or destroy yours.

The greatest problem facing any society is drawing the line between individual rights and maintaining the order necessary for society to function. As Alexander Hamilton pointed out, “without order, there is no liberty.”

Theodore Roosevelt had a similar view when he said, “Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.”

Because people have different views about how the order necessary for a working society should be structured and maintained and the degree of personal freedom optimal for that society, effective government requires compromise.

Yet today, both the far left and the far right seem to have forgotten this, each side wishing to impose through force of law its vision for society, even though some of those beliefs impose constraints on others that are not necessary to maintain order and public safety and legal imposition of some beliefs can result in physical harm to others.

A good example of such extremism are laws that prohibit abortion in all circumstances as well as any procedure that might conceivably result in abortion or miscarriage. As a result, both women and their unborn children are dying at record numbers in states like Texas.

Another is requiring Christian theology be taught and actively practiced in schools and other public, when roughly one-third of all Americans are not Christians. What’s ironic about this is that many of those insisting that Christian theology be more publicly imposed are violently opposed to the Islamic practice of Sharia, which would impose Muslim beliefs as law.

On the left, the attempt to require institutions mandate which pronouns are used by whom is nothing more than speech police. While I understand and respect people’s desires to maintain and announce their own gender preference, that should be a personal preference, not a government requirement. Requiring everyone to announce their gender identity by specific pronouns goes too far and attacks the right to personal privacy.

Unfortunately, the apparent simplicity of absolutism in government and religion can be so seductive that common sense – and compromise – are all too often swept away.