[powerslacker]

> I fail to see a distinction here. The government defines what is legal. I suppose one can appeal to some higher power as the source of all law or something idealistic like that, but that's not how the IRS or the Texas State tax assessor work.

Right. That's what I mean by conflating. One can appeal to a higher law. I'd argue that's the only way you can make a moral judgement about the actions of a government, since as you've pointed out they have the ability to create laws. So either there is a law that can be used to judge whether a 100% tax on the individual is justified or there isn't. If there isn't a higher law, then you're right - the government is a law unto themselves. They are totally sovereign and no one can make any moral judgement about their actions since by definition their might makes them right. Alternatively, there is a higher law: a supernatural moral law that transcends the will of men and which the governments of the world and all the people of the world are accountable to. If that's the case then there is a limit to how far the government is able to justifiably tax its citizens - the amount that the transcendent law allows gives them jurisdiction to tax.

It's important to note that if there is no law that transcends the state, then the state is not limited by moral law in any way. In that case it's the source of moral law and nothing that the state does can ever be justified as moral or immoral since under such a worldview the state is the judge of good and evil.

[hotpotamus]

I suppose the problem you run into is that supernatural moral law is ephemeral and probably caught up in some religion or other which means something different to every member of that religion (as far as I can tell), whereas as actual law is written down, and actually exists.

[powerslacker]

Laws are non-material by definition. You can't eat or touch the law of gravity for example.

Using "caught up in a religion" or "means something different to every member" as a reason to ignore an argument is arbitrary and an a priori dismissal of potential evidence contrary to your beliefs. In other words, you are ruling out a position simply because you are prejudiced against that position.

There are laws which claim to be moral supernatural law which are written down. If these laws are what they claim to be and are truly of supernatural origin then not only do they exist, they exist in a greater capacity than laws written by human hands or instruments.

A transcendant law presupposes a transcendant author and arbiter.