There are many laws put into effect in the past that make no sense today. As federal laws are carefully constructed to have concrete language, we rarely see these obsurd laws. Since the 10th Amendment in our Bill of Rights gives power to the State in governing themselves, laws are created and suited for the community. In Florida, a parking meter must be paid if one was to tie an elephant to it. In Illinois, it is forbidden to fish from a giraffe's neck. In Iowa, ministers need to obtain a permit prior to transferring liquor over state lines. In many states, the punishment for horse theft is still hanging. For all the "dumb" laws you may find, just realize that for them to be created, someone had to have violated it.
Psychologically, if anything, these laws put a smile on faces. For cynics, it may stir their faith or confidence in the efficiency of their government.
My question is why haven't a lot of these laws simply be removed? Have people been arrested/fined for any of these "dumb laws" recently? Are these kinds of dumb laws still being created?
Well for some of these laws, like the ones that involve hanging for instance, don't actually ever go through, the laws were issued many, many years ago sometimes and as we progress as a nation, the states can issue their own laws, but for like the hanging one, you would go to jail for theft, but that's about it. Why they have not taken the laws down? I'm not sure, these blue laws as they are called, are usually repealed, barely enforced, and are usually declared unconstitutional. So the only ones that might actually go through are the laws dealing with alcohol. I know one state if you put an ice cream cone in your pocket and cross the street, you can go to jail. I know, stupid.
I've gone through and read laws like these before. They are absolutely absurd. It makes me wonder as well, why no one has simply excluded them. I guess a good reasoning would be that if they aren't ever enforced they aren't hurting anyone. I went and found a site that lists stupid laws for the state of iowa
http://www.bitoffun.com/stupid_laws_iowa.htm
I went to the website you listed and read through the laws. Stuff like this really makes my day so much better! The city laws of Destin, Florida were ones that specifically caught my attention. I have been to Destin multiple times for vacation and I vaguely remember my relatives who live down there telling me about a few of the dumb laws listed on the website. I think laws such as these are completely worthless to even have because we all know no body is going to really enforce them. Even if some of the laws were enforced, I don't think people would necessarily stop doing what they're already doing because they will view the law as dumb and more of an inconvenience than anything.
These couple dumb laws were favorites of mine:
1. If an elephant is left tied to a parking meter, the parking fee has to be paid just as it would for a vehicle.
2.In Miami it is illegal to park your elephant on 8th Street on Sundays after 1pm.
Question.....how many elephants are in Florida??? I guess I never knew that they were such a popular "pet" down there!
I found a site that lists dumb laws in almost every state in the U.S. Of course, as the website states, some of the laws they list have probably been repleaed and some may have been made up.
http://homepages.nildram.co.uk/~jimella/laws01.htm