Arizona republican., 1921-06-12
By Frederic J. Haskin


 WASHINGTON. June 1o.-In en- acting laws regulating what we drink and wear. what we read and see in the movies. and what we do on Sum day. we are going back to the ideals of the Middle Ages and of ancient Greece and Rome according to stu dents who have been digging up the history of sumptuary legislation Not the Puritans of New England. but Cato. the Roman censor. is the real ancestor of the present movement to regulate our private lives by law. they say.
 This is not said in any invidious spirit. but merely to show the true origin and development of the cen- serious spirit as exhibited in law.
 The blue laws of New England were nearly all designed to enforce the observance of the Sabbath. as far as can be learned. for some of these laws are known only by hearsay. In most of these colonies all of the per- sons were of one faith. and the laws seem to have been designed to make the individual live up to the obliga- tions which he assumed in embracing that faith. rather than to regulate his private life in general
 The present reform wave in the United States. on the other hand, IS professedly an attempt to make us all moral by preventing us from do- ing anything which the reformer con- siders immoral. The observance of Sunday Is minor part of the move ment. The prohibition law Is. of course it's great achievement. This has been followed. and to some ex- tent accompanied. by campaign against tobacco. which has material ized in the form of state legislation against cigarettes There is also a movement to regulate the dress of women, which has produced some scathing denunciations from the cler- gy, some state legislation. and efforts on the part of high school superin- tendents to regulate the dress of girl pupils
 More vigorous and successful is the effort to regulate the movies and the publication of books. Movie censor ship is firmly established in severa states and determined effort is be- ing made to spread it. Within fhs past year two books. said by oui leading critics to be of considerable literary value. have been suppressed on the ground that they might not hs good for the morals of the young. Cato Would Understand The Puritan fathers of New Eng land would scarcely have understood such comprehensive moral cam paign without a preliminary religiou | motive, but Cato. the censor. wh' | lived in Rome a little over 20OO year ago. would have understood it per | fectly. There were no movies then | but the Greek literature was invadini | Rome and Cato opposed it on th | ground that it was immoral, Just a | the Society for the Suppression O | Vice in New York now combats tn invasion of this country by the Eu ropean point of view.
 Cato was also friend of the Op plan law. which regulated the dres of women. and which should interes the legislators of some of our west efn states. It provided that no wom an should possess more than half a ounce of gold, or wear dress or oil ferent colors or ride in a carriag in the city except at religious cere monies. The women registered ter rife protest against this law. ( which Livy gives an account IL al most amounted to feminine revolu ton. The law was finally repeate after being on the books for 20 year with old Cato holding out against tn repeal to the bitter end
 The Orchian law, limiting the nun Der of guests at entertainments an the Fannin law prescribing how muc could be spent upon them "ere ais favorites with Cato. The latter Ia Drovided that if a Roman citizen ha friends to dinner he could serve T fowl except a single hen, and th' could not be fattened-
 The Didian law extended these pr' visions all over Italy. and made u guests at a party just as guilty the host in case they ate fat chicke It was revived by Sulla who added
 it by limiting the amount that cou
 be spent on a funeral. While he vi in power his wife died. and he buri'
 her sumptuously, violating his ov
 laws. and afterward he violated son
 more of them by giving lively parti
 at which he sought to rorget his so
 row.
 Julius Caesar was also reform
 and enacted the sanae kind of law
 He went so far as to station his D
 licemen in the markets to see tn the housewives did not buy anythi