Everyday Ethics

Another boisterous 4th of July has come and gone, filled with the booms and bangs of fireworks being shot off, as well as the inevitable horrific fireworks injury that always seems to accompany this holiday.  This time, it was an exploding fireworks truck in North Carolina killing three people.  These dangerous results, as well as the threat of personal injury and fire, have led many states to outlaw fireworks in at least some form.

My own state of residence, Colorado, allows only the most timid fireworks, such as sparklers and ground snakes.  This prohibition is made more complicated by Colorado’s close proximity to Wyoming, which allows even the most dangerous fireworks to be sold.  Now that another injury-ridden 4th is behind us, I can’t help but wondering, should fireworks be illegal, and if not, why not?

The method of analysis for this question should be familiar.  We have already discussed the social problems of drugs, guns, and pornography, and the way in which a society committed to political liberalism, which the U.S. happens to be, might answer these types of questions.  Our purpose here will be to utilize past investigations as a template for answering the question of whether fireworks should be legally permitted.

To briefly review, political liberalism is committed to three core values:  autonomy, equality, and neutrality.  Neutrality is the least controversial, stating that political liberalism is neutral with regard to conceptions of the good life.  From this, we can conclude that neutrality doesn’t clearly either eliminate or allow the possibility of a liberal society that permits fireworks.

Equality is probably the least relevant of these core values in this case, because fireworks contribute nothing one way or the other to the equality of persons.  Whereas a case can be made that allowing gun ownership levels the playing field for the weaker members of society, no such argument can be made for fireworks.  But fireworks don’t inhibit equality either.  For our purposes, we can set equality aside as a relevant consideration.

This leaves us with the core value of autonomy, and the question of whether a liberal society would include possession of fireworks as essential to our autonomy.  But there is a further consideration that political liberalism must also take into account.  The harm principle, which political liberalism endorses, states that if an action is harmful to others, it can be banned.  Otherwise, it cannot.  So the question of whether a liberal society should permit fireworks depends on how significant of a liberty buying fireworks actually is, and whether the harms of fireworks outweigh the value of this liberty.

We will have to keep this analysis brief, partly because autonomy can be interpreted either widely or narrowly, as we’ve discussed elsewhere, and because we lack sufficient space for such a treatment of it.  We will also have to set aside the middle position of banning only exceedingly dangerous fireworks, and focus on the extreme views of either total or zero prohibition.  With these qualifications in place, the following seem like the most possible arguments in favor of each extreme view.

Someone who wants to ban all fireworks would probably claim two things.  First, even if banning fireworks is a violation of personal autonomy, buying fireworks is itself a very low value liberty.  Second, the harms of fireworks are extremely serious, usually involving personal injuries, fires, and deaths.  The victims are often younger children and families.  The low value of the liberty and the high cost of the harm clearly tell in favor of a total ban on fireworks.

Someone who wants to allow all fireworks will probably also make two claims.  First, banning fireworks is a violation of personal autonomy, and any violation of such a valuable right must be justified by citing the substantial harms that it would prevent.  Even if being able to buy fireworks is itself a low value liberty, the autonomy to do so is of immense value.  Second, the harms of fireworks, although serious, are extremely unlikely and thankfully rare.  Of the millions of people who shoot of fireworks on the 4th of July, very few are actually injured.  The harm that would be prevented by a ban on fireworks is not significant enough to justify such a serious infringement on personal autonomy.

Like most social and political questions, this one cannot be easily answered here.  It seems that both the proponent and the opponent of a ban on fireworks have compelling reasons in their favor.  Which side one favors will largely depend on one’s own preferences concerning the values at work in each argument.

Many people reading this will likely find it ridiculous to think that we might have good reasons to ban something that is so ingrained in our cultural traditions.  After all, fireworks are part of how we celebrate America itself.  What could be wrong with that?  But a practice being common or culturally endorsed doesn’t make it morally and socially preferable, and it’s worth thinking seriously about whether the things we take for granted as obviously acceptable really are so.

About the Author

Elijah Weber is a graduate student at Bowling Green State University. He holds a Master's degree in philosophy from Colorado State University, and Bachelor’s degrees in sociology and philosophy from Chapman Univerity. He currently lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan with his wife Laura, his son Brandon, age two and a half, and two cats, both of whom are mentally deranged.