Good morning,
Whitewater’s forecast calls for a chance of showers and a high temperature of fifty-three degrees.
There are no municipal meetings in the city today. I’ll post on Whitewater’s municipal budget — a tepid, status quo effort if ever there were one — over the weekend.
The Wisconsin Historical Society recalls that on this day in 1836, Governor Dodge signed Wisconsin’s first bill into law. It was a particularly bad one, a mistaken regulation, ignorant and disrespectful of the political tradition of the country.
On this date territorial governor, Henry Dodge, signed the first law passed by the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature. The law prescribed how the legislators were to behave, and how other citizens were to behave towards them. For example, it authorized “the Assembly to punish by fine and imprisonment every person, not a member, who shall be guilty of disrespect, disorderly or contemptuous behavior, threats, in the legislature or interference with witnesses to the legislature; also to expel on a two thirds majority in either house a member of its own body…” This did not keep the members from vociferous arguments, fist fights, or even shooting one another (see Odd Wisconsin on the entry in This Day in Wisconsin History for February 11th)
Could a city, today, lawfully have a provision like this? No, not close to this, regarding citizens. That hasn’t stop some from trying versions of this effort. That’s a post, though, for another day.