At
Archives of Maryland 204:202:
WHEREAS the calamity of fire breaking out in so
populous a town as
Baltimore is greatly to be dreaded, and every preparation ought to
be
made by the inhabitants to prevent its spreading whenever it doth
break out;
II. Be it enacted,
by
the general assembly of Maryland, That ever householder
within the said town, whose real property therein is assessed to one
hundred
pounds or upwards current money, shall be obliged to keep him or herself
provided with two good and sufficient leather buckets marked with the
owner's
names, and hung up near the front door of their dwelling house, which
buckets
shall be used for no other purpose but handing water at fires; and
every such
householder now residing within the said town, shall be allowed six
months
from the end of this present session of assembly, to procure the said
buckets, and
every such person, who shall hereafter come to reside in the said town,
shall be
allowed three months from the time of their residence and assessment
as aforesaid
to procure their said buckets.
Analogous to the mandatory gun ownership laws of the period and, dare I say it, analogous to a
state mandatory health insurance law. (A federal law is obviously a rather different situation.)
Running this out on a tangent, I wonder how many old laws are still on the books that a city could use to "generate revenue" by fining people.
ReplyDeleteFor example, if there's a fine associated with this, even a small one, Baltimore could basically fine *EVERYONE* in the city for it these days.
The fastest way to get an unpopular or antiquated law repealed is to start enforcing it vigorously. Idaho still has laws on the books prohibiting adultery and fornication. They are probably not enforceable post-Lawrence (as much as I find the reasoning of the Lawrence decision incorrect), but if a county prosecutor did make that attempt, it would lead to a rapid repeal, even if the courts did not rule in unconstitutional. Look at what happened when Connecticut was still enforcing its criminal statute against adultery in 1990.
ReplyDeleteIncreasingly, frustrated with how the greed of a small number of lawyers is making life unreasonable for ordinary people.
ReplyDelete百分之九十九 的 律师 打 坏 其馀 百分 之一 的 名声 。
Clayton,
This came up in my Chinese101.com exercises. "Ninety-nine percent of all lawyers give the rest a bad name."
Cheers,
-dlj.