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Neither Traveling Nor Amusement on Sundays

Sundays were the “Sabbath”, on which the colonial laws decreed that there should be neither traveling nor amusement, and certainly no labor, but “a solemn and decorous observance of the day by everybody, and a general attendance at the public services in the meetinghouse.”

The laws also decreed that there should be no profane swearing, nor cursing whether of persons or other creatures. No one was to get drunk, there were to be no brawls. If a debtor did not meet his obligations, his creditors could have him whipped, sent to the workhouse, or put in the stocks.

Even a preacher about whose orthodoxy there should be any suspicion could be arrested by a justice of the peace and required to answer upon matters of faith and doctrine. And before a man and woman could marry, their intentions were to be proclaimed at three religious meetings during the preceding fortnight.

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