Every year for as long as I can remember Law faculties around the world review archaic laws & silly laws still on the statute books in their jurisdiction. The funniest are usually published in January each year. I went looking today, but I guess this years batch hasn't been released yet...so here is a blast from the past...
* Atheists aren’t allowed to run for office in Texas. Though the Lone Star State prohibits “religious tests” as a qualification for candidates, anyone wishing to run for office must acknowledge the existence of a “Supreme Being”.
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/st...15-3?r=US&IR=T
The Texas Post (December 3, 2014)
http://www.texasmonthly.com/the-dail...fice-in-texas/
"Politics can frequently devolve into absurdity, but the race for the Austin City Council seat in the newly-created District 4 has been remarkably absurd in ways, in fact, that highlight some of the weird things about the entire state of Texas. Or, at least, its constitution..."
(In the race one aspirant accused another of being a self confessed atheist. The accusation based on a paper he'd written many years before. The accuser cited the Constitution of Texas to make the case that the accused should be dismissed from the contest.)
"[The accused] denies being an atheist—he told the Statesman that he considers himself a Catholic—and that the paper was “more about finding spirituality than losing it”...
[The accuser] is correct that the language [of] the Texas Constitution [prohibits an atheist from holding public office], but that doesn’t mean that an atheist—which, it’s worth reiterating, [the accused] says he is not—is actually barred from holding office in Texas. Article VI of the U.S. Constitution, in the No Religious Test Clause, makes clear that restrictions like the one in Texas are unconstitutional.
All of which raises an important question: If that restriction is unconstitutional, what’s it doing in the Texas Constitution?"
...officeholders [can] believe in a Supreme Being of [any] sort (whether it be the Judeo-Christian God, Zeus, a hodgepodge of cobbled-together bits of freshman-year philosophy, The Force, etc), but the requirement in Texas has never been successfully challenged in court, because no candidate has ever been denied the opportunity to serve because of it....
...It’s a little strange, admittedly, for the Texas Constitution to still have an obviously unenforceable, unconstitutional bit of language..."
* Atheists aren’t allowed to run for office in Texas. Though the Lone Star State prohibits “religious tests” as a qualification for candidates, anyone wishing to run for office must acknowledge the existence of a “Supreme Being”.
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/st...15-3?r=US&IR=T
The Texas Post (December 3, 2014)
http://www.texasmonthly.com/the-dail...fice-in-texas/
"Politics can frequently devolve into absurdity, but the race for the Austin City Council seat in the newly-created District 4 has been remarkably absurd in ways, in fact, that highlight some of the weird things about the entire state of Texas. Or, at least, its constitution..."
(In the race one aspirant accused another of being a self confessed atheist. The accusation based on a paper he'd written many years before. The accuser cited the Constitution of Texas to make the case that the accused should be dismissed from the contest.)
"[The accused] denies being an atheist—he told the Statesman that he considers himself a Catholic—and that the paper was “more about finding spirituality than losing it”...
[The accuser] is correct that the language [of] the Texas Constitution [prohibits an atheist from holding public office], but that doesn’t mean that an atheist—which, it’s worth reiterating, [the accused] says he is not—is actually barred from holding office in Texas. Article VI of the U.S. Constitution, in the No Religious Test Clause, makes clear that restrictions like the one in Texas are unconstitutional.
All of which raises an important question: If that restriction is unconstitutional, what’s it doing in the Texas Constitution?"
...officeholders [can] believe in a Supreme Being of [any] sort (whether it be the Judeo-Christian God, Zeus, a hodgepodge of cobbled-together bits of freshman-year philosophy, The Force, etc), but the requirement in Texas has never been successfully challenged in court, because no candidate has ever been denied the opportunity to serve because of it....
...It’s a little strange, admittedly, for the Texas Constitution to still have an obviously unenforceable, unconstitutional bit of language..."
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