The Waterbury Democrat., 1934-01-18
In
 New York
Rv PAUL HARRISON

New York.-If any natlVe soA of Gotham gets to bragging about | the modernity and liberality of his city, you can squelch him with little talk about New York laws. .. A good way to begin is to ask him whether he knows that mil lions of New Workers technically are criminals because they borrow | books from the public libraries. 1 Then you can go on to explain that Section 1427 of the Penal code provides a maximum punish | ment of three years Imprisonment l for any person "who removes, or assists in removing, any books, manuscript or coin from any rel erence library except for the purpose of repairing 1t or transfer ring it to another library |. That law was made before IT, braries began to lend books, and nobody has got around to chang ing it.
 | York blue laws because they're not enforced. But they're there, all right, just waiting for some hyper scrupulous authority to come | anu Jul d lCW poh day golfers. skaters, bridge-play- CTS and such. Tho law has been amended to permit Sunday fishing and Sunday baseball, but those are the only changes It is against the law to hold a horse race with in mile of any courthouse; also to run q horse on any public high | way.
 Law breaking Play
 One of the most popular plays | Broadway ever saw--"The Green Pastures" lawbrcaker be- | cause it is expressly forbidden that there shall be "any representation of the Divine Person in a public place. And this play. which has negro in the role of "De Lawd." is hailed by religious folk every where as a deeply reverent produc- tion.
 | Since the big, bad bears of Wall street went on the rampage, q good many citizens have had occa- sion to look up the bankruptcy law and the items of personal property it cXempts from seizure. This has proven very enlightenlng. Say, for example, that Judgment has been slapped on the assets and effects of bankrupt broker living in a three-rOom apartment on the twenty seventh floor of q building on Park avenue. These arc the Lares and Penates which the law says he can take away with him; "All stoves kept for use in a dwell- 1 ing house; one sewing machine the family Bible and school books ten sheep with their fleeces, and clothes made thereof: one COW, two swine, one team of horses and horse feed for 60 days; | fuel and oil for use of the family | for 60 days; one milking pot. one teapot, one shovel and one lamp"
 Regulating Religion
 | Ministers, and especially revival
 ists, arc almost constantly breaking
 the New York law which makes it a crime to attempt to induce a
 person to adopt or practice reli- gious belief" Since this law ob-
 viously does not apply to attempts to induce persons to abandon their
 religious beliefs. 1t has not been
 invoked against Charles Smith, president of the Society for the Ad- l Vancement of Atheism. But 1t was possible to arrest him under an old ordinance which forbids
 clergymen from speaking in public
 without special police permit.
 You can imagine how it annoy
 ed Smith-the only man in town
 whose sole profession is atheism
 ito be classed as a clergyman.
 Police, though, stoutly maintainedf that religious talk, either pro or
 con. was preaching. Smith was
 convicted, but carried his case to
 the state court of appeals, where
 the decision was reversed. It was
 Q hallow victory, though, because
 the board of aldermen then
 changed the ordinance to include
 atheists Smith is heading for
 Seattle now, there to begin an
 anti-religious. speaking tour along
 the Pacific coast.