Well, When the Saints Go Legislatin'

Massachusetts Bay Colony was busy on this date:

• 1631 - to "improve morals" it was ordered: "[A]ll psons whatsoeuer that haue cards, dice, or tables in their howses, shall make away with them before the nexte Court, vnder paine of punishmt."

• 1638 - during The Antinomian Controversy, the First Boston Church ruled: "Anne the wife of our Brother Willyam Hutchinson having on the 15th of this Moneth beene openly in Publique Congregation admonished of sundry Errors held by her was on the same 22th day Cast out of the Church for impenitently persisting in a manifest lye then expressed by her in open Congregation."

Can you smell the freedom? At least they hadn't started hanging Quakers yet.

That said, given I see so many damned gambling ads whilst trying to watch sportsball, maybe that 1631 law wasn't such a bad idea...