Frank Reichert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in part: >The 'Blue Laws' you seem to refer to here didn't enjoy such wide >or universal acceptance either.
AFAIK when I was a child, most states had them. Maybe I should be clearer, although I think I'm using the term usually used. I refer to state (and in some cases municipal) laws forbidding certain types of business on Sundays. Supermarkets & dept. stores were closed, etc. >You still haven't provided me any evidence at >all that Christmas was outlawed in any other region of the >colonies as they existed during the early times of English rule. The thread has migrated a bit. At one point we were discussing, not specifically whether Christmas was legal, but how closely Christmas was tied in with the beliefs that made America what it is, and therefore at least glancingly, libertarian thought & tradition. Bill in giving examples against pointed to the starkest cases, in pre-revolutionary New England, where at certain times & places Christmas was illegal. However, I pointed out that later, starting ca. 1800, in much more of the country than New England, came a flowering of evangelism, which, among many other things, opposed Christmas as it was then celebrated, i.e. with booze. It was a NY-PA axis (largely aligned against the Democrats) that first kept Christmas alive and then transformed it into something even the evangelicals could accept, and that took much of the 19th Century. So any tie connecting Christmas, tradition, USA patriotism, and liberty must be a very weak one. In Your Sly Tribe, Robert _______________________________________________ Libnw mailing list Libnw@immosys.com List info and subscriber options: http://immosys.com/mailman/listinfo/libnw Archives: http://immosys.com/mailman//pipermail/libnw
