OZschwitz: Ban lifted on duels but the law still rules

QUEENSLAND is scrapping the ban on challenging one's foe to the ancient form of dispute resolution favoured by aristocrats, the duel.

It is also relieving mayors and sheriffs of the statutory duty to interrupt a riot to read the Riot Act before those in the angry crowd - who may or may not be receptive listeners - can be charged.

North of the Tweed, it remains an offence to challenge someone to a duel, a response to a perceived slight made popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the cause of a spot of bother for at least one sitting American vice-president.

Thomas Jefferson's second-in-charge, Aaron Burr, shot and killed a former Treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton, in a New Jersey duel over a long-simmering rivalry in 1804. Burr was charged with murder but acquitted.

The Queensland Government is modernising its criminal code, under which challenging for a duel is still punishable by three years' jail. It believes the small hurdle of other offences, such as murder or threatening violence, will prevent a duelling renaissance.

The same legislation removes the 300-year-old duty imposed on a mayor, sheriff or justice of the peace to read a section of the English Riot Act of 1714 before rioters can be charged with certain offences. That law was revoked in England in 1974.

The Queensland Attorney-General, Kerry Shine, told Parliament this week: "In this day and age, one might think the mayor reading out the Riot Act would inflame rather than calm the rioters."

It remains an offence to promote a prize fight in Queensland - punishable by a year in jail - or to be drunk in a public place.

LNK

OZschwitz: Ban lifted on duels but the law still rules

OZschwitz: Ban lifted on duels but the law still rules

Anarcho-Capitalist Categorical Imperatives

Via AnCaps: Law & Enforced Unnatural Order