Will’s post about the Go-Green campaign (which I’ll be writing about in much greater detail once I actually understand its objectives) got me thinking about all the other things that we, as citizens, are not really aware of. The most important is the law as it’s on the books. I’m fascinated by the law because it’s a [free] source of great entertainment and provides some insight into just how perverse people who fabricate them are.

In order to delve into the rich world of potential perversity I took a look at Fairfield’s laws (the Fairfield Municipal Code [external pdf]). It’s a fascinating document for a great many reasons. One disturbing thing about this document is on the very first page. This being the municipal code of the city, which presumably my tax-dollars went toward creating in some form or the other, is restricted in all manner from re-distribution. I tried to copy the exact quote from the first page, and what I got was this:

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If that looks like garbage to you, it’s because the document IS RESTRICTED! Thanks LexisNexis for stopping me from copying text from my town’s municipal code! I’m going to give the benefit of the doubt to the city rep who was tasked with making the code available online, since they probably did not know any better. Anyway, what that string of gobbledygook really says is:

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Well, that sucks, since this is the municipal code that relates to us, and I want to distribute, store in a retrieval system and reproduce on my blog the perverse stuff that you all so desperately need to know about! I can’t believe that it’s even legal for a company to copyright municipal codes and law to the degree that I can’t print them, have access to them in a reproducible format, or redistribute them for public comment! Better yet, because of their copy-protection, you can’t even search the document!

To be perfectly honest there aren’t really that many juicy/meaty things in the Fairfield Municipal code, but if you’re really looking you should go directly to Chapter 9.12 Indecent or Immoral Acts. I love the wording, which appears to have been written in a previous era (1965, but still …). It’s weird that the same document that talks about cable television also has statements like :

9.12.020 Secreted for obscene purpose.

No male shall secrete himself with any prostitute or with any woman not his wife for any obscene purpose in any room, building, cellar, or other place within the city, and no female shall secrete herself with any male not her husband for any obscene purpose in any of the above-mentioned places within the city (Ord. 626-9-2 ss 1, 1980: Ord. 478 ss 35, 1965).

To spell it out: that means that you can be obscene (or secrete yourself) with your spouse but not anyone else. But gay people are exempt (why do they get to have all the fun?!). Conveniently there’s no clear indication of what might be deemed “obscene”. I guess we’ll know it when we see it (but can I be the one to judge please?). Hmm, that brings up the point of whether the punishment for this crime might itself be obscene or secretory.

Now that we’ve set the bar sufficiently low for my future posts, we can comfortably move on