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Connecticut Sen. Matt Lesser (D-Middletown) has apparently reviewed every law ever passed in the United States and found the worst one.

Not the Fugitive Slave Act.

Not the Indian Removal Act.

Not the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

A Medicaid work-requirement bill.

“This is the most irresponsible piece of legislation in American history,” Lesser told the CT Mirror.

That is the kind of sentence that makes you wonder whether the senator is familiar with American history, Medicaid policy, or either.

The dispute involves HUSKY D, Connecticut’s Medicaid program for low-income adults without dependent children. The new federal rules require certain recipients to show they are working, training, volunteering or otherwise meeting an 80-hour monthly community engagement standard.

That is not exactly a radical concept.

Taxpayers are being asked to fund health coverage for able-bodied adults. Asking some of those adults to work, train, volunteer or prove they are exempt is a normal eligibility rule, not a national atrocity.

Lesser’s complaint is that people may lose coverage if they do not satisfy the new rules or qualify for an exemption.

But eligibility rules are not new. Medicaid already depends on income limits, categories of eligibility and documentation. Work requirements add another test for certain adults. They do not turn the program into a national scandal — let alone the worst law in American history.

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 allowed slaveholders to pursue escaped slaves into free states and helped deny accused runaways basic legal protections.

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 went further. It forced ordinary citizens in free states to assist in capturing escaped slaves and punished those who refused. Federal commissioners deciding these cases were paid more if they ruled the accused person was a runaway than if they ruled the person was free.

That was Congress creating a bounty system for human bondage.

The Indian Removal Act forced Native Americans from their homes and helped produce the Trail of Tears.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act reopened the slavery question in the territories and helped drive the country toward civil war.

Lesser looked at that list and decided Medicaid paperwork finally topped it.

This is not compassion. It is historical illiteracy.

Lesser is not arguing over the details. He is trying to make the existence of rules sound cruel.

That is the trick: Turn verification into punishment. Turn eligibility into oppression. Turn the basic taxpayer question — who qualifies? — into a five-alarm moral emergency.

At some point, the English language deserves a restraining order against Matt Lesser.

If Lesser believes Medicaid work requirements are worse than laws that returned escaped slaves to bondage, forced tribes from their land and helped lead the country into civil war, he should say so plainly.

If he does not believe that, he should stop saying things this stupid.

Connecticut voters deserve an honest debate over Medicaid, work requirements and the cost of entitlement programs. They do not need elected officials turning American history into a prop for a social media tantrum.

Matt Lesser wanted to sound morally superior.

He ended up sounding like a politician who would rather put on a show than defend his own argument.

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