EARLY AMERICAN SUNDAY LAWS.' VIRGINIA. (America's First Sunday Law, 1610.) PENALTY OF DEATH FOR NON-ATTENDANCE AT CHURCH ON SUNDAY." America's first Sunday Every man and woman shall repair in the morning to the divine service and sermons preached upon the Sabbath day, and in the afternoon to divine service, law, 1610. and catechising, upon pain for the first fault to lose their provision and the allowance for the whole week following; for the second, to lose the said allowance and also be whipt; and for the third to suffer death.* 1 These are the real "blue-laws." They are not taken from the "Peter's Code," but from the legal codes and original statute books as indicated by the references given. All of the thirteen original colonies are represented here except South Carolina, and this is represented by duplication, as indicated in note under Georgia. See page 47. 2" Articles, Laws, and Orders, Divine, Politique, and Martial, for the Colony in Virginia: first established by Sir Thomas Gates, Knight, Lieutenant-General, the 24th of May, 1610. Again exemplified and enlarged by Sir Thomas Dale, Knight, Marshall, and Deputie Governour, the 22d of June, 1611." Reprinted at Hartford, in 1876. 3 This was at the time that the Virginia plantation held all things in common; and if the Sabbath was not observed according to the requirements of the government, all supplies were cut off. Persecution in Vir "The first settlers [of Virginia] were emigrants from England, of the English church, just at a point of time when it was flushed with complete victory over the religions of all other persuasions. ginia. Possessed, as they became, of the powers of making, administering, and executing the laws, they showed equal intolerance in this country with their Presbyterian brethren who had emigrated to the northern government. Several acts of the Virginia Assembly, of 1659, 1662, and 1693, had made it penal in parents to refuse to have their children baptized; had prohibited the unlawful assembling of Quakers; had made it penal for any master of a vessel to bring a Quaker into the State; had ordered those already there, and such Law of 1623-24. Law of 1705. Punishment for blasphemy. LAW OF 1623-1624 REQUIRING CHURCH ATTENDANCE.1 Whosoever shall absent himself from divine service any Sunday, without an allowable excuse, shall forfeit a pound of tobacco, and he that absenteth himself a month shall forfeit 50 lbs. of tobacco. FIVE SHILLINGS, FIFTY POUNDS OF TOBACCO, OR TEN LASHES If any person of full age shall absent from divine service at his or her parish church or chapel, the space of one month (except such Protestant dissenters as are exempted by the act of Parliament made in the first year of King William and Queen Mary) and shall not, when there, in a decent and orderly manner continue till the service be ended: and if any person shall on the Lord's day, be present at any disorderly meeting, gaming, or tippling, or travel upon the road, except to and from church (cases of necessity and charity excepted) or be found working in their corn, tobacco, or other labor of their ordinary calling, other than is necessary for the sustenance of man or beast; every as should come thereafter, to be imprisoned till they should abjure pages 39-41. 1 Hening's 2 Mercer's Statutes at Large," volume i, page 123. "Laws of Virginia," page 320. such person being lawfully convicted of any such default or offence, by confession or otherwise, before one or more justice or justices of the county, within two months after such default or offense made or committed, shall forfeit and pay five shillings, or fifty pounds of tobacco for every such default or offence; lings or fifty and on refusal to make present payment, or give sufficient caution for payment thereof at the laying of the next parish levy, shall, by order of such justice or justices, receive, on the bare back, ten lashes, well well laid on. laid on.1 LABOR ON SUNDAY FORBIDDEN UNDER PENALTY OF ONE DOLLAR Five shil pounds of tobacco. Ten lashes Act passed Dec. 26, If any person on the Sabbath day shall himself be found laboring at his own, or any other trade, or call- 1792. ing, or shall employ his apprentices, servants, or slaves in labor, or other business except it be in the ordinary household offices of daily necessity, or other work of necessity or charity, he shall forfeit the sum of one dollar and sixty-seven cents, for every such offense, deeming every apprentice, servant, or slave, so employed, and every day he shall be so employed, as constituting a distinct offence." 1 From these statutes it is clearly to be seen that the great object of their enactment was church attendance and the religious observance of the day. 2" Certain Acts of the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia," page 112. the Since religion was disestablished in Virginia and the other original States, the later American Sunday laws have not required church attendance; but they have continued to call Sunday Sabbath day," and to forbid ordinary labor, business, trade, recreation, and amusements as formerly on that day the prerequisites to church attendance and to the religious observance of the day. They are religious, and their object is still religious; they simply fall short of specifying in words, and plainly requiring, their real object. The idea still prevails that the aid of civil law is essential to Sabbath observance, just as formerly the tithing laws, or state taxation for Church at tendance not required. |