In the preceding chapter I dealt with that heritage of lawlessness in America which is the historical background to any discussion of the question. I tried to show how, from the first settlement in the seventeenth century to the last rioting in Chicago, we have, for one reason and another—often political, sometimes racial, occasionally geographic, usually economic—developed a disrespect for law. Granted that background and granted, as must be, the truth of what Mr. Hoover says, what is the situation in which the patriotic citizen, anxious to obey the law of the land, finds himself to-day? In the first place, there is the infinite number of laws and ordinances—Federal, state, municipal—which Congress and forty-eight state legislatures, not to mention lesser bodies, are turning out literally by thousands every year. I have seen the statement that taking all the law-, ordinance-, and regulation-making bodies in the country together, over twenty thousand statutes were passed in one year regarding railroads alone. Despite the fact that state boundaries are imaginary lines which have ceased to have any meaning for us in daily life, the laws of every state vary. The metropolitan area of New York City lies within three states. For some years I lived in New Jersey and worked in New York.[Pg 128] I spent half my waking hours in one state and half in the other, and I lived under two different sets of laws relating to inheritance, taxation, and to innumerable other matters of daily concern. Had I commuted to Connecticut instead of to New Jersey, I should have had to learn an entirely new set of laws and regulations, for ignorance of the law is no excuse for disobedience.