Bad Neighbors + Bad Neighbors = Lots of Laws
Jun 10th, 2010 by Timothy Pancoast
A while back I was reading a short story by William Faulkner entitled A Rose for Emily. As I observed the interactions between the eccentric Miss Emily and the people, especially the government of the small town she lived in I developed a theory on legislation. It states that most laws are made by and/or because of bad neighbors. The rest, the good laws, the just, the laws that really matter are eternal. Though people may discover them, they aren’t made by mortal men at all.
In that sense the quantity and density of a society’s laws can be considered a measure of its citizen’s failure to be good neighbors. I realize that I am not the first to come up with a similar theory to explain why we have laws, but I can only share my personal experience with stumbling upon it.
This article offers 50 demonstrations of that theory, one for each state. They are all laws that were created because citizens failed to interact in a neighborly way. The example from Delaware:
“It’s illegal to get married on a dare.”
Something tells me that they could have found worse, but if this is the most outlandish our state laws ever get than we aren’t doing half bad. The example from Colorado is perfect for my theory, and I have to wonder exactly what the situation was that brought it about.
“It’s unlawful to lend your vacuum cleaner to your next-door neighbor (Denver).”
It has to take either a lot of bad neighbors or one really bad neighbor in order to make them put a law like that on the books.
I don’t know if it’ still on the books, but Tennessee used to have a law giving a 75% discount on hunting licenses to anyone who was legally blind. I guess the theory was they wouldn’t be able to hit much.
“It’s unlawful to lend your vacuum cleaner to your next-door neighbor (Denver).”
I wonder if there is a “vacuum cleaner lobby” that encouraged that law . lol
Illegal to get married on a dare ? Wait a minute….I’ve been living a lie !
))
I would think gettting married on a dare is punishment enough.