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Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · August 25, 1892

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 7, No. 33

THE Mail and Express, however, exults at this puerile enforcement of a religious law, and exults because it does enforce what the Mail and Express thinks is religion:—

The attention of at least one New Yorker has been brought suddenly and forcibly to the fact that there is a State law forbidding fishing on Sunday,

and that public acquiescence in its infraction has not operated to repeal the law. The General Term in the Second Department has just emphasized the law by affirming the conviction of a prominent New York sportsman who was arrested a year ago for fishing in a private pond, near Newburg. The effect of this decision will be to remind Sunday fishermen that they are liable to arrest and punishment anywhere within the confines of the Empire State. Around New York, in the Hudson River, in Lake George and the Adirondacks, the prohibition has long been considered as practically a dead letter, and has been violated constantly and without the slightest restraint; and because what is everybody’s business is nobody’s, arrests have been exceedingly infrequent. Here, however, is Section 265 of the Penal Code, which Judge Cullen’s General Term opinion holds to cover all the waters, public or private, in the State of New York: “All shooting, hunting, fishing, horse racing, gaming or other public sports, exercises or shows upon the first day of the week, and all noise disturbing the peace of the day are prohibited.”

If civil law can prohibit one from fishing in a private pond on Sunday, what are the limits of civil authority for the enforcement of the observance of Sunday?