There is something strange about the way we talk about basic public needs in America.

We spend enormous amounts of time arguing about whether something is a right.

Is healthcare a right or welfare?

Is clean water a right or a public service?

Those arguments may matter to lawyers and philosophers.

But they distract from a much simpler question.

What does a functioning society actually need?

Mississippi needs reliable water systems.

The Fifth Circuit recently ruled that the Constitution does not establish a standalone right to clean drinking water.

The case involved Jackson residents who alleged that city officials allowed contaminated water to reach their homes and then misled them about its safety.

The court rejected their constitutional claims.

But the ruling doesn’t make the water problem disappear.

Mississippi’s own law says an adequate supply of safe, pure drinking water is essential to public health and welfare.

It also says viable water systems are important to the state’s economic development.

That second part deserves more attention.

Water infrastructure is economic infrastructure.

A community with unreliable water has a harder time sustaining itself and growing.

So why are we spending so much time asking whether clean water is a constitutional right?

Why not ask what Mississippi actually needs and then build it?

This is where our political arguments often become unnecessarily small.

Government policy should transcend simply arguing about whether somebody deserves a government benefit.

We need investments in the productive capacity of the state.

That is the larger question Mississippi should be asking.

Not whether government is big or small.

Not whether clean water fits neatly into somebody’s definition of a constitutional right.

But what do we need to build to make Mississippi more productive and more capable?

Water is one of those things.

So are roads, bridges, energy systems, agricultural infrastructure, and other facilities and networks that allow businesses to get products to market.

We should not be afraid to use government when government can help build the things an economy needs.

Mississippi doesn’t need another philosophical debate about whether clean water is a right.

It just needs water systems that work.

And we should be willing to build them.