That's bad in itself. But, worse - most laws as written in federal and state codes aren't even the actual laws. The real laws are what my lawyer friends call

That's bad in itself. But, worse - most laws as written in federal and state codes aren't even the actual laws. The real laws are what my lawyer friends call the 'case law' - the historical precedence and rules of courts. And, case law is completely impractical for any average citizen to even find, let alone read and understand. I like to ask these friends the provocative question, "so, when are you guys going to make the laws easier for average people to understand." And, they facetiously reply, "What, you want us out of a job?" And, they're right. There is no incentive for anyone in the legal hierarchy to make laws more accessible. Maybe our legislatures can fix it. But, we Americans consistently elect into office more lawyers. As a software development analogy, that's like hiring programmers to decide the features and interfaces of the systems that they will get paid to maintain. And, there's a reason that good software depends on people of different disciplines (designers, product managers, subject matter experts) coming together.