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Too many dumb laws on the books

By Woody Bass | Monday, March 10, 2008, 03:50 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Woody's Bio

One of the greatest gifts the Founding Fathers bestowed upon this great nation was to give some legislative independence to its member states.

Unfortunately for us, if dumblaws.com is any indication, the states may have gotten a little carried away with that power.

Georgia, for example, apparently has a law that prohibits profanity in front of a dead body in a funeral home or coroner’s office. State officials also apparently get a pass from being ticketed for speeding when they are in session, and I’m sorry but you’re just not allowed to carry an ice cream cone in your back pocket either… on Sunday.

There didn’t appear to be any specific references of dumb laws for Gwinnett County or any of its cities but it wouldn’t surprise me if there were plenty.

For all the dumb laws we have to abide to, there are two in particular that I feel should be near the top of the list.

The first is the Sunday alcohol sales ban, which back in 2006, is a subject I touched on when the voters of Winder and Norcross said yes to allowing Sunday alcohol sales by the drink. I still believe that Georgia’s Blue Law is just as ridiculous today, and apparently 47,146 fellow Georgians (well 47,147 now that I signed) agree with me that have signed a petition ask the state legislature to repeal the ban.

You can see (and sign) the petition here: http://www.petitiononline.com/GASB138/petition.html.

This ban should be repealed not because neither I nor anyone else can remember to stock up by Saturday evening, but because it was enacted to kiss up to constituents of one particular faith. I hold a pretty strong position on the separation of church and state at all levels of government.

This week proves that Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands have a bit more commonsense than the rest of the nation as we observe another dumb law - Daylight Saving Time.

Even after reading an article on the history of the time change on NationalGeographic.com, I still hold out a whole lotta doubt that it has any usefulness even though the article quotes Bill Mosley of the U.S. Department of Transportation on studies that the time change may conserve energy, reduce traffic accidents and fatalities, and even crime.

While those are certainly important to me, I remain skeptical that the time change has any real impact on them. Maybe I’ll put that to the test this year here in Gwinnett and report back on that later in the year.

Are you as ready to repeal these dumb laws as I am?