From a typo to a challenge
It’s a lesson every writer will learn sooner or later.
Leave a typo anywhere and it will be noticed.
The Legal Genealogist is resigned to that fact, but is turning the tables on readers with one today.
Yesterday, when I posted a link on Facebook to yesterday’s blog post about names that can be found in law books,1 fumble fingers here began the post by saying: “There’s morel than just laws in law books.”
And, as could have been predicted with 100% certainty, two sharp-eyed readers questioned whether the post was about mushrooms2 or the names were those of people who might be described as fungi.3
Sigh…
At least nobody questioned whether there were recipes in the law books.
But that set me wondering: were there laws about mushrooms?
So here’s the challenge, dear readers.
Can you find a law about mushrooms somewhere in the United States?
The rules are:
1. It has to be a reference to mushrooms in the text of the law itself. A comment in the footnotes or annotations to the law doesn’t count. Yeah, I’ll accept fungi as a synonym but only if it really refers to something edible and not something like yeast or molds.
2. It can be any law from any jurisdiction.
3. It can be any law about any topic, not just agriculture or the like, as long as it mentions mushrooms.
4. It can be from any time frame — but in case of multiple answers, the earliest-adopted law wins.4
So while your intrepid blogger is off sightseeing in Arizona (and getting ready for tomorrow’s sold-out 2019 seminar of the West Valley Genealogical Society), you can hit the books.
Ready.
Set.
Go.
Mushrooms in law books should be fun.
SOURCES
Cite/link to this post: Judy G. Russell, “Mushrooms in law books,” The Legal Genealogist (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : posted 15 Feb 2019).
- Judy G. Russell, “Naming names in Arizona,” The Legal Genealogist, posted 14 Feb 2019 (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : accessed 15 Feb 2019). ↩
- Comment, Charlotte Sellers, on Judy G. Russell Facebook status, 14 Feb 2019. ↩
- Ibid., comment by Matthew Cross. ↩
- Wins what, you ask? Why, the admiration of all your colleagues, and a mention of your research prowess online. What more could a genealogist ask for? ↩
Found 4 references in CT Statues:
https://search.cga.state.ct.us/r/statute/dtsearch.asp?posted=posted&submit1=&name=&number=&requestopt=phrase&request=mushroom&sort=name&sortorder=ascend&stemming=1&db=SURK
Here’s from the Western Pennsylvania Mushroom Club. https://wpamushroomclub.org/education/mushroom-picking-rules-regulations-in-pa/regulation-of-sales-of-mushrooms-in-pa/
Go back a page and there are multiple references to the actual picking of mushrooms.
https://wpamushroomclub.org/education/mushroom-picking-rules-regulations-in-pa/
From the Michigan Modified Food Code; Michigan Food Law, see page 50, 3-201.16 Wild Mushrooms. https://www.michigan.gov/documents/mdard/MI_Modified_2009_Food_Code_396675_7.pdf?20150315175456
I went with statutes, not regulations or case law, even though there’s plenty to be found there too.
The morel is the state mushroom of Minnesota. Minn. Stat. Ann. § 1.149 (adopted 1984).
Virginia recognizes a festival in honor of mushrooms. Va. Code Ann. § 2.2-3321 (enacted 2001).
Maine regulates the harvesting of wild mushrooms. 22 Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 2175 (initial enactment 2011).
The state of Washington has defined “specialized forest products” to include more than 5 gallons worth of wild edible mushrooms. Moreover, a “wild edible mushroom” is one that is “not cultivated or propated by domestic means.” Wash. Rev. Code Ann. § 76.48.021(21)(f), (25) (2009, initial enactment 1967).
California authorizes the use of “spores or mycellium capable of producing mushrooms” as long as they are to be used in specific types of scientific research. Cal. Health & Safety Code § 11392 (enacted 1985).
Put in Mushrooms in the digital Washington State Records and came up with a long list to slog through. Picked one in Walla Walla and there was an un nofficial ordinance about marijuana which included agricultural uses of land including for mushrooms. I will watch what other come up with!
And yes on rereading I made some typos!!!!
https://thethirdwave.co/history-of-psilocybin-mushrooms/
In October 1968, the US federally banned psilocybin Mushrooms). Two years later, along with other psychoactive/hallucinogenic substances like LSD, mescaline, and cannabis, psilocybin was classified as a Schedule I drug.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_status_of_psilocybin_mushrooms
1971
The legal status of unauthorised actions with psilocybin mushrooms varies worldwide. Psilocybin and psilocin are listed as Schedule I drugs under the United Nations 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances.[1] Schedule I drugs are defined as drugs with a high potential for abuse or drugs that have no recognized medical uses. However, psilocybin mushrooms have had numerous medicinal [2][3][4] and religious uses in dozens of cultures throughout history and have a significantly lower potential for abuse than other Schedule I drugs.[5
Here’s another from Washington:
§ 230, “Wild Mushrooms,” in 1987 Session Laws of the State of Washington (Olympia: Statute Law Committee, 1988), 1055; digital images, Washington State Office of Code Reviser (http://leg.wa.gov/CodeReviser/documents/sessionlaw/1988pam1.pdf : accessed 15 February 2019).
“A person who picks mushrooms growing wild on any land, or who picks flowers, fruit or foliage from a plant growing wild on any land, does not (although not in possession of the land) steal what he picks, unless he does it for reward or for sale or other commercial purpose.” (Theft Act 1968, for England and Wales)
I read the “l” as an exclamation point, as in “[But wait,] there’s more!” (I really need new glasses.)