Recent amendments now except from the prohibition the retail sale in Anne Arundel County of all foodstuffs, automobile and boating accessories, flowers, toilet goods, hospital supplies and souvenirs, and exempt entirely any retail establishment in that County which employs not more than one person other than the owner. 27, § 521, which generally prohibits the sale on Sunday of all merchandise except the retail sale of tobacco products, confectioneries, milk, bread, fruit, gasoline, oils, greases, drugs, medicines, newspapers and periodicals. In the same way, the blue laws challenged in McGowan protected Sunday as a day of rest for the general public.ĪPPEAL FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF MARYLANDĪppellants, employees of a large department store on a highway in Anne Arundel County, Md., were convicted and fined in a Maryland State Court for selling on Sunday a loose-leaf binder, a can of floor wax, a stapler, staples and a toy, in violation of Md.Ann.Code, Art. In Everson, school bus services protected the public’s children from the hazards of traffic. Like in Everson, a religious purpose happened to coincide with a secular one, but did not supersede it.
This case was the first of four challenging the constitutionality of blue laws in 1961. Sunday was a day of rest and recreation in the secular sense as well as the religious one – therefore, blue laws neither aided nor hindered religion. Though the Court acknowledged that these laws had originally had a religious purpose, it ruled that over time these statutes had come to emphasize secular considerations. These employees objected that Maryland’s blue laws violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Employees of a department store were arrested and fined after violating these “blue laws” by selling prohibited merchandise on a Sunday.
State laws in Maryland allowed only certain items to be sold on Sundays. Maryland, the Supreme Court established the precedent that laws with religious origins are constitutional provided that they serve a secular purpose.
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