Measure targets archaic blue laws
Some statutes date to Colonial times
Massachusetts residents could spit on the sidewalk, give a tattoo, even commit blasphemy or adultery without fear of a fine or jail time under a bill being considered on Beacon Hill.
The bill would repeal nearly two dozen so-called blue laws, which often deal with moral or religious issues. The laws are often considered outdated or even unconstitutional, but remain on the books.
One of the laws provides a $300 fine or year in jail for anyone who "wilfully blasphemes the holy name of God by denying, cursing, or contumeliously reproaching God, his creation, government, or final judging of the world."
Another sets a $20 fine for anyone who spits on a sidewalk or "any city or town hall, any court house or court room, any public library or museum, any church or theatre, any lecture or music hall, any mill or factory."
Even though tattooing is now legal in Massachusetts, there's still a law on the books providing for a $300 fine for anyone giving a tattoo who's not a doctor.
The bill would also eliminate laws declaring the Communist Party a subversive organization, making adultery a criminal offense punishable by three years in jail or a $500 fine, and barring anyone from "acting in a suspicious manner around any steamboat landing, railroad depot, or any electric railway station."
The bill was one of dozens included in a public hearing Tuesday by the Judiciary Committee.
Some of the laws, such as the prohibition on blasphemy and adultery, date to Colonial days and were later incorporated into state law.
Others, such as the ban on spitting, date to a time when lawmakers believed, mistakenly, that spitting was an easy way to transmit tuberculosis, a disease that was a grave public health threat before the advent of antibiotics.
The bill's sponsor - state Representative Byron Rushing, Democrat of Boston - said there is more than just legal house-cleaning behind the legislation.
"There was a feeling that we shouldn't have laws that we never use," he said. "And there were a few laws that could be used and shouldn't."
Rushing also said there's nothing stopping a prosecutor from using one of the old laws in a new context.
He pointed to the example of a rarely used 1913 law that barred the state from marrying any couple who couldn't marry in their home state. That law is not among those in the blue law repeal bill.
The law was approved when many states barred intermarriage between blacks and whites.
It was rarely used in Massachusetts, but was dusted off following the same-sex marriage ruling to block same-sex couples from outside Massachusetts from marrying here.
"The 1913 law is an example of what happens when you have a law on the books that shouldn't be there," Rushing said.
He said he anticipates objections to repealing some of the laws, but said the committee should back a bill covering the most obviously unconstitutional or outdated laws. 