Blue laws, for the uninitiated, enforced the concept that Sunday, in our Christian city and nation, was a time for churchgoing, not for "shooting, hunting, fishing, sporting, playing, horse-racing, gaming, frequenting of tippling houses, or any unlawful exercises or pastimes," as an 1828 state statute put it.
As a Las Vegas statute puts it, "an indigent person is a person whom a reasonable ordinary person would believe to be entitled to apply for or receive" public assistance.
Such breadth means that the law is "sweeping... [the] reach of the statute puts it in conflict with the First Amendment... the statute would apply with equal force to personal, whispered conversations within a home".
Orin Kerr, a former federal prosecutor and assistant professor at George Washington University, said his reading of the relevant statutes put the phone companies at risk for at least $1,000 per person whose records they disclosed without a court order.
Few other states have statutes putting employee interests so firmly ahead of business interests.
"Given that we had 21 criminal justice acts passed over the 13 years of the last administration, I am sure that Labour [MPs] will understand why we are loth to find even more statutes to put on the statute book".
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney Gen. Jerry Brown refused to defend the statute, which put the defense in the hands of private attorneys who support Prop 8. From this vantage point, it appeared that they fell into a serious trap.
But having something that's a non-fiscal item -- a separate part of the statute put into the emergency bill, with hardly any review and it's very complex -- we're the first state in the nation to have it -- the bill will pass.
Among the opponents of the law was the Obama administration, which filed a challenge that led to the most controversial parts of the statute being put on hold.
The way the Court has been operating since its establishment in 2002 has clearly shown the strengths and weaknesses of the Rome Statute as put in place in 1998.
Thompson and his lawyers agreed, arguing that a "plain reading" of the Texas statute could put even the "street photographer, the entertainment reporter, patrons of the arts, attendees to a parade or a pep-rally, [and] even the harmless eccentric," at risk of incarceration.
