SUNDAY LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES AND LEADING JUDICIAL DECISIONS HAVING SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE JEWS BY ALBERT M. FRIEDENBERG OF THE NEW YORK BAR This summary is devoted to an examination of the Sunday laws now (1908) in force in the United States and of the leading reported decisions in which the courts of justice have sought to construe these statutes. SUNDAY LAWS The Sunday laws in effect in the States of the United States were collected for the Massachusetts Labor Bulletin, in 1905. They are here reproduced, the material having been brought down to date (1908). Alabama.-Any person who compels his child, apprentice, or servant to perform any labor on Sunday, except the customary domestic duties of daily necessity, or works of charity, etc., and any merchant or shopkeeper (except a druggist) who keeps open store on Sunday, is subject to a fine or a fine and imprisonment; these provisions do not apply to the running of railroads, stages or steamboats, or other vessels navigating the waters of this State, or any manufacturing establishment, which requires to be kept in constant operation. [Chap. 195, Sec. 5542, Code of 1897.] 1 All the Sunday statutes of the different States, of Canada and of European countries are collected in Labor Bulletin of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, No. 36 (June, 1905), reprinted in Report [on] Observance of the Lord's Day, Boston, 1907, p. 41 et seq. The reader is also referred to papers and notes by the present writer in Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, Nos. 11, 12, and 13. Arkansas.-Every person who shall on the Sabbath or Sunday be found laboring, or shall compel his apprentice or servant to labor or to perform other services than customary household duties of daily necessity, comfort, or charity, shall be fined. Every apprentice or servant compelled to labor on Sunday shall be deemed a separate offense of the master. The provisions of this act shall not apply to steamboats and other vessels navigating the waters of this State, nor to such manufacturing establishments as are required to be kept in continual operation. No person who from a religious belief keeps any other day than the first day of the week as the Sabbath shall be required to observe the first day of the week usually called the Christian Sabbath, and shall not be liable to the penalties enacted against Sabbath-breaking, provided that no store or saloon shall be kept open or business carried on there on a Christian Sabbath, and provided, further, that no person so observing any other day shall disturb any religious congregation by his avocations or employments. Every person who shall keep open any store or retail any goods, wares, and merchandise on Sunday, shall be subject to a fine. [Chap. 48, Secs. 2030 to 2042, Digest of 1904.] California.-Every employer who causes his employees or any of them to work more than six days in seven, except in the case of emergency, whether the employee is engaged by the day, week, month, or year, and whether the work performed is done in the day or night, is guilty of a misdemeanor. [Sec. 653e, Codes and Statutes 1885 and Chap. 158, Acts of 1901.] Colorado.-A penalty is imposed upon any person carrying on the business of barbering on Sunday in any city of the first or second class, whether incorporated by general law or special charter. [Chap. 73, Acts of 1893.] Places where liquors are sold shall be closed from 12 o'clock Saturday night until 6 o'clock Monday morning. [Chap. 36, Sec. 1346d, 1891-1905.] Connecticut.-Persons are forbidden under penalty of a fine to do any secular business or labor, except works of necessity or charity, or keep open any shop, warehouse, or any manufacturing or mercantile establishment, or expose any property for sale, or engage in any sport, between 12 o'clock Saturday night and 12 o'clock Sunday night. [Chap. 89, Sec. 1369, General Statutes of 1902.] The statute exempting Seventh-Day Sabbatarians is discussed below. No railroad company shall run any trains on any road operated by it within this State between sunrise and sunset on Sunday, except from necessity or mercy, provided that trains may be run carrying the United States mail, and such other trains as may be authorized by the railroad commissioners on application as being required for public necessity or for the preservation of freight. No such company shall permit the handling, the loading or the unloading of freight on any road operated by it between sunrise and sunset on Sunday, except from necessity, provided that this provision is not applicable to the handling, the loading or the unloading of freight by transfer of said freight between steamboats and cars until 8 o'clock in the forenoon, where it is found that the same is required by public necessity. Violations of these provisions are subject to penalty. [Chap. 215, Secs. 3749 to 3751, General Statutes of 1902.] No law affecting travel, business, or labor on Sunday, or the operation on Sunday of any railroad or railway, shall apply to any railroad company or street railway company so as to prohibit or limit the operation on Sunday of electric cars. [Chap. 217, Sec. 3875, General Statutes of 1902.] Delaware.-A fine is imposed upon any person performing any worldly employment, labor, or business on the Sabbath (excepting works of necessity and charity). A fine is also imposed upon any carrier, peddler, or driver of any public stage or carriage who shall travel or drive with his horse, pack, wagon, stage, or carriage upon the Sabbath, as well as upon any retailer of goods who exposes the same to sell on the Sabbath. It is provided that any justice of the peace may stop any such person so traveling upon the Sabbath, and detain him until the following day. [Chap. 131, Sec. 4, Revised Code of 1893.] Any person who carries on or engages in the business of shaving, hair cutting, or other work of a barber, or who opens or allows to be open his barber shop for the purpose of carrying on business on Sunday, shall be deemed guilty of misdemeanor, and shall be subject to a fine or imprisonment. [Chap. 264, Acts of 1899.] District of Alaska.-Any person keeping open a store, shop, grocery, bowling alley, billiard room, or tippling house for the purpose of labor or traffic, or any place of amusement on Sunday, shall be punished by a fine, provided that this provision does not apply to the keepers of drug stores, doctors, undertakers, livery stable keepers, barbers, butchers, and bakers; and all circumstances of necessity and mercy may be pleaded in defense, the treatment of such subjects to be determined by the jury. [Chap. 429, Title 1, Acts of U. S. Congress, 1898-1899.] District of Columbia.-A penalty is imposed upon any person performing work or doing any bodily labor on Sunday, and upon any person compelling or allowing servants to do any manner of work or labor on the Lord's Day (works of necessity and charity excepted). [Chap. 16, Sec. 107, Compiled Statutes.] Florida. Whoever follows any pursuit, business, or trade on Sunday, either by manual labor or with animal or mechanical power, except it be work of necessity, shall be punished by a fine. Whoever keeps open store or disposes of any wares or merchandise on Sunday, or sells or barters the same, shall be punished by a fine. In cases of emergency or necessity, merchants and others may dispose of the necessaries of life to customers or others without keeping open doors. Whoever employs his apprentice or servant in labor or other business on Sunday, except it be ordinary household business of daily necessity or works of charity, shall be punished by a fine. [Part 5, Title 2, Secs. 2638 to 2640, Revised Statutes of 1891.] Nothing contained in the laws of Florida shall be construed so as to prohibit the preparation or printing between the hours of midnight Saturday and 6 in the morning Sunday of any newspaper intended to be circulated and sold on Sunday, or to prohibit the circulation and sale on Sunday of same, or to prohibit the circulation or sale on Sunday of any newspaper theretofore printed. [Chap. 5164, Acts of 1903.] Georgia. If any freight train, excursion train, or any train other than the regular trains run for the carrying of mail or passengers, shall be run on any railroad on the Sabbath, the superintendent of transportation of such railroad company, or the officer having in charge the business of that department of the railroad, shall be liable to indictment in each county through which such train passes, and shall be punished as for a misdemeanor. The following are the exceptions to this provision:A train which has one or more cars loaded with live stock, and which is delayed beyond schedule time; a freight train running over a road on Saturday night, if the time of its arrival at destination according to schedule be not later than 8 o'clock Sunday morning; special fruit, melon, and vegetable trains, the cars of which contain no other freight except perishable fruits, fish, oysters, fresh meats, etc., and which trains shall be loaded and leave the station from which they start in this State before midnight on the Saturday night previous to the Sunday on which they are operated; to trains on railroads where the line of said railroad begins and ends in another State, and does not run a distance greater than thirty miles through Georgia. Any person who shall pursue his business or work of ordinary calling on Sunday (works of necessity or charity excepted) shall be guilty of misdemeanor. [Penal Code, Div. 10, Sec. 420 and Sec. 422, Code of 1895.] Hawaii.—All labor on Sunday is forbidden (excepting works of necessity or charity), except that on Sunday until 9 o'clock in the morning barber shops may be kept open; and fresh meat and fresh |