Query: "blue laws"

[Baker, John]

        I meant that nobody has found them on blue paper.  However, it
is true that the more dramatic supposed examples of blue laws were in
fact fictitious.  Detailed information is available in Trumbull, The
True-Blue Laws of Connecticut and New Haven and the False Blue Laws
Forged by Peters (1876), online at
http://www.quinnipiac.edu/other/ABL/etext/trueblue/bluelawsmain.html.

John Baker


-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
Of Joel S. Berson
Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2006 2:28 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Query: "blue laws"

Do John and Fred mean there were no such laws, or that nobody has found
them on blue paper?

I suspect that the OED2 definition, "blue laws, severe Puritanic laws
said to have been enacted last century at New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.",
should at least have its "said to have been" deleted.

Joel

At 3/21/2006 10:09 AM, you wrote:
>However, nobody has ever found such a set of laws.
>
>FWIW, I have studied this question and my conclusions accord with
John's.
>
>Fred Shapiro

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