Odd Laws. Jenny Paschall

The court awarded her $50,000 damages.

      Let’s hope she doesn’t make a trip to Rhode Island, where it was proposed that there should be a two-dollar tax levied on every act of sexual intercourse.

      In England it is against the law to kiss in a cinema or to embrace in the street, while in London you cannot make love in trains, buses, parked cars, churchyards, churches or parks.

      In Riverside, California, kissing is illegal – unless both parties first wipe their lips with rose water. In Halethorpe, Maryland, you don’t need rose water but a stopwatch to remain on the right side of the law – it is illegal to kiss for more than one second. And just in case you wonder how seriously these laws were treated, in the eighteenth century a sea captain in Boston was sentenced to spend two hours in the stocks for kissing his wife in public on a Sunday after returning from three years at sea.

      Still more kissing – in Indiana, anyone who sports a moustache and who ‘habitually kisses human beings’ is breaking the law.

CHAPTER 4

       Till Death Us Do Part

      Ian Bell, a carpet-fitter from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, claimed in the divorce courts that his wife’s possessiveness was making his life unbearable. He told the court how his wife had made him move house because attractive women lived on the street and forced him into their bedroom whenever neighbours were sunbathing. He also related how he finally lost his temper and threw a plant at her. Bell pleaded guilty to causing his wife actual bodily harm with a rubber plant, but was released after the court was shown photographs of the injuries he sustained from the fight.

      The newest problem being dealt with in American divorce courts is custody of the pets. US lawyers are reaping massive fees for dragging domestic animals through America’s courtrooms to decide which party is best for the animal’s interests. The United States Humane Society has warned that the pets may suffer from post-divorce depression. One couple, however, managed to compromise – they decided amicably that neither party was more deserving of custody – so they had their dachshund put down.

      Lars Jonsson refused to join his wife in attending a demonstration against domestic violence in Stockholm. His wife, Anne, felt it was only right that she should have her man at her side to show domestic unity – so she tried to convince him to accompany her. Unfortunately, her methods were a little extreme and Lars ended up in hospital with a fractured skull as a result of the beating she gave him.

      In Sicily, it was once customary to bite off your spouse’s nose if she was unfaithful.

      Sometimes the smallest incident can lead to murder. A Parisian night-watchman, Noel Carriou, broke his wife’s neck because she under-cooked his roast dinner. He served a twelve-year sentence for the crime (possibly the judge shared his passion for good food and felt Monsieur Carriou had some cause for anger). He was released after seven years, and subsequently remarried. Unfortunately wife number two burnt the roast, so Carriou stabbed her. He received an eight-year sentence. Perhaps he should have tried wooing Delia Smith!

      Stuart Dingley of Dudley, West Midlands, stabbed his girlfriend to death when she switched off the television during an FA Cup Final replay.

      When Mrs Anne Bass, the former wife of a Texas millionaire, was offered a divorce settlement of $535 million, she turned it down. She claimed it was not enough to keep her in the style to which she had become accustomed.

       Divorced couples in Vancouver now have the opportunity to remove their exes from their lives forever. Divorce X will remove the image of your former spouse from family photographs and replace it with pleasant scenery. The service costs about $100 per photograph. It is also possible to fill the space with a new lover.

      In Saudi Arabia, if a man does not provide his wife with regular amounts of coffee, she can divorce him.

      Nina Housden was certainly a cool-headed murderess. She fell asleep in the front seat of her car while it was being repaired in a garage in Toledo – seemingly unconcerned that her husband’s dismembered corpse, wrapped in Christmas paper, was on the back seat. The grisly package was discovered by the mechanic, who called the police. Nina was awoken and arrested.

CHAPTER 5

       House Rules

      In Rumford, Maine, it is against the law to bite your landlord.

      It is illegal for a married couple to live in an abandoned bus in Upton on Severn.

      Housewives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, are banned from hiding dirt and dust under a rug.

      Californian housewives must boil their dusters after use. Failure to do so could result in a fine or jail.

      In 1937 spring cleaning became compulsory in Hungary. All lofts, garrets and cellars had to be spring cleaned. Fines were imposed on citizens who did not comply.

       A law in Baltimore, Maryland, makes it illegal to clean a sink, no matter how dirty or stained it may be.

      In Portland, Oregon, you are breaking the law if you shake a feather duster in another person’s face.

      Legislators in Nappanee, Indiana, have decreed that washing lines must be less than fifty inches in length, and women must never hang their underwear outside at any time. Scranton, Pennsylvania, doesn’t care how long the line is but if women are hanging their underwear outside to dry, there has to be a fence high enough to screen the undies from neighbours and passers-by. In Los Angeles women can hang their laundry outside openly in the summer, but not at all in winter.

      Taking a bath prior to ten p.m. is strictly illegal in Piqua, Ohio; codes in Clinton, Indiana, declare that it is illegal to bathe at any hour during the winter; and in the State of Virginia and Topeka, Kansas, it’s against the law to put a bathtub in a house.

      In New York City it is illegal to carry a skeleton into a tenement building.

      Clean Air Act? Every citizen of Kentucky is required by law to take a bath once a year. The residents of Barre, Vermont, are far more clean living, since they must bathe at least once a week to stay on the right side of the law.

      In Kidderminster it is an offence to own a bath without a watertight plug. In Dallas, Texas it is illegal to have a leaking tap.

      In Portland, Oregon, its unlawful to bathe without wearing suitable clothing – bathers must be covered from neck to knees.

      In Stanford, North Carolina, a man drove to City Hall wearing only a towel, to complain that his water had just been shut off in the middle of his shower. After the city pointed out that his account was overdue and that it had mailed two warnings, the dripping-wet complainant stood in line, paid his bill, and returned home to finish his shower.

      Until the nineteenth century, baths in Spain were illegal because they were said to be a heathen abomination.