Thank goodness we have wise and forward thinking elected officials to provide the right law for any occasion. As alluded to in the title of this post, the Town of Sharon, Connecticut at its very first town meeting back in the 1700's, promptly affirmed the good character of its nose-ringed swine. This makes sense because none of those hogs had collars or licenses so there was no better way to tell the unruly stray from the law abiding resident pig. Nowadays, everyone and his sister has a nose ring so it's not so easy to separate the sheep from the goats.
We have other very useful ordinances and statutes in Connecticut. Here is one that will keep our Town Clerk from multitasking as a barkeep:
Chapter 545
Sec. 30-97. Town and probate records not to be kept where
liquor is sold.Town or probate records shall not be kept in any room in
which alcoholic liquor is sold, nor in any room from which
there is direct access to a room in which such liquor is
sold. Any town clerk or judge of probate violating the
provisions of this section shall be subject to the
penalties provided in section 30-113.
One imagines that there were difficulties with this sort of thing back in 1949 when Chapter 545 went on the books, but it is hard to credit that there was once an outbreak of copulation on the job in Massachusetts taxi cabs, but something along those lines seems to have prompted a law that prohibits taxi drivers from making love in the front seat of their taxi during their shifts. What they do in the back is, presumably, their own affair as long as the meter isn't running. The Bay State also prohibits gorillas from riding in the back seat of any car, be it a taxi or otherwise.
While I would like to confirm the actual ordinances in question still exist, this site claims that:
"The New York City Transit Authority has ruled that women can ride the city subways topless. New York law dictates that if a man can be somewhere without a shirt, a woman gets the same right. The decision came after arrests of women testing the ordinance on the subways. A transit police spokesman said they would comply with the new rule, but 'if they were violating any other rules, like sitting on a subway bench topless smoking a cigarette, then we would take action.'"
It is important to know what rules apply or you are liable to become a common scofflaw unintentionally. Hello to all my peeps in Brooklyn: "Don't let your donkeys sleep in the bathtub." And none of you New Yorkers can get a divorce because of irreconcilable differences unless you both agree to do so. Good luck with that.
Without the will to enforce it, any law is just paper and ink. But a little legal housecleaning appears to be in order. Otherwise my gorilla and donkey are going to need to learn how to drive for themselves and find someplace else to sleep.
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