Can somebody provide me with legal citation for a so called "dumb law"?

Question

You all saw the websites that says that there are laws like:
"The penalty for jumping off a building is death."
or
"A person may not walk around on Sundays with an ice cream cone in his/her pocket."
See e.g. http://www.dumblaws.com/

For some reason I believe that they are all B.S.

Can somebody provide me with a LEGAL citation for al least ONE such a law?

To chslaw:
It bears to note that Cal Pen Code § 11225
Does not ban bathhouses per se.
It only bans them if the owner encourages or permits acts that can transmit AIDS, i.e. sex.
If you run a clean bathhouse -- it is legal.

Concerning whales:
I did some research myself

Cal Fish & G Code § 3002
USED to say whales, now it says “marine animals excluding sea lions”
The reason for this is too allow whalers to harpoon whales from boats, which are defined as vehicles in California.

Answer 1

You know, that is an excellent questions and I believe you may be correct. Consider the following "dumb laws" the are allegedly from California as claimed by www.dumblaws.com:

1. Sunshine is guaranteed to the masses.

2. Animals are banned from mating publicly within 1,500 feet of a tavern, school, or place of worship.

3. Bathhouses are against the law.

4. It is a misdemeanor to shoot at any kind of game from a moving vehicle, unless the target is a whale.

5. Women may not drive in a house coat.

6. No vehicle without a driver may exceed 60 miles per hour.

Of those 6, only No. 3 has a citation given for the law. California Penal Code Section 11225 does prohibit bathhouses, a law that was adopted in response to the AIDS crisis. It might not be an incredibly useful law, but is it really dumb?

In California, it IS illegal to shoot game from a moving vehicle, mainly because it is an incredibly dangerous activity. However, I did a search of the entire California Fish & Game Code and Penal Code and found no reference to an exception for whales.

So you may be right, a number of these "dumb laws" might not even exist.

Answer 2

You're pretty much right. I wouldn't say that all of them are B.S., since absolute statements require more time and effort than I care to put forth, but I can tell you that many are bunk. Others were once true, but have since been repealed because they applied to specific people who have since passed and situations that no longer exist.

Examples from my home state:
"It's a felony to mispronounce the name of the state song under the Alaska State Constitution."
Uh, the state song is "Alaska's Flag." If you manage to mess that up, you have bigger problems than a judge can solve. Never existed, and has also been attributed to Arizona (state song: "Arizona.")

"In Alaska it is illegal to feed a moose alcoholic beverages."
Total fabrication, made up in an interview with the operator of a local comedy revue. Published in the 1997 edition of the Alaska Almanac (basically a flashy tourist guide).

"In Fairbanks, Alaska it is illegal for a moose to walk on the side walk. This dates back to the early days if the town when the owner of the bar had a pet moose that he used to get drunk. The moose would then stumble around the town drunk. The only way the law makers could prevent this from happining was to create the law so the moose could not cross the sidewalk and get into the bar."
Was once real, enacted before WWI, and repealed several decades ago.

There's even a website [1] which parodies such e-mailed lists by creating random lists of fake dumb laws. Hope this helps!