This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items from the newly acquired Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection.
Massachusetts is known for many things- ridiculously high taxes, fanatical sports teams, and this year “historic” winter storms. What I was unaware of until now were the seemingly crazy laws that exist in our history until I started flipping the pages of this book. Why would one limit the height of a dog to 10 inches and that of a cat to 48 inches? The idea for Comics in the Law came from the popularity of the radio broadcasts of “Freak Laws” by Lyman Cook on the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) and Station KMOX in Saint Louis, Missouri during the 1930s. Cook was a member of the Missouri Bar and the book is a compilation of these bizarre laws often accompanied by hilarious illustrations. Here are a few gems I noticed that refer to our great state of Massachusetts.
What’s wrong with Christmas? When the Puritans came over to America they also brought their dislike of festivity with them and commemorated Christmas by praying, reflecting on sin, and working instead of resting. In 1659 the Massachusetts Bay Colony even went so far as to charge a five shilling fee for anyone caught celebrating. This law lasted a long 23 years but it took almost another two hundred before the state declared Christmas to be an official holiday in 1856. It can best be summed up by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow who wrote “We are in a transition state about Christmas here in New England. The old Puritan feeling prevents it from being a cheerful hearty holiday; though every year makes it more so.”
Apparently a man cannot refuse to marry a woman simply because she has a bad disposition. This was upheld in a case tried in Suffolk County between Anna D. Van Houten vs. Asa P. Morse in 1894. She claimed breach of promise of marriage against him and the jury returned a verdict supporting her.
If a man and a woman enter into an engagement to marry…or that there was a want of affection on her part, or an incompatibility, resulting from disparity of age, difference in character and dispositions, and other causes, will not justify him, as matter of law, in breaking the contract.
To learn more about bizarre laws across the country look for Comics in the law, by Lyman E. Cook … [Chicago,Universal publishers, c1938] which can be found in Widener’s collection.
Thanks to Alison Harris, Santo Domingo Project Manager, for contributing this post.