1970 society makes 1855 laws obsolete
Kansas updates Criminal Code
By CAROLYN BOWERS
Kansan Staff Writer
1970 will mark the enactment of the first complete revision of Kansas criminal laws passed over a century ago.
The new Kansas Criminal Code, effective July 1, updates the present code passed by the first territorial legislature in 1855.
"Some concepts of the old law are no longer usful," said Paul Wilson, professor of law. "The social situation has changed and they don't fit."
Wilson was a reporter for the Advisory Committee on Criminal Law Revision. Headed by Judge Doyle E. White, Arkansas City, the committee was established by the Kansas Judicial Council in September, 1963, to study the state's criminal law and make recommendations for its revision. The Code, passed by the 1969 Kansas Legislature, is the product of five and a half years of study and evaluation.
As reporter, Wilson examined each section of the present Code, compared them to similar statutes of other states and sought the advice of judicial authorities. He then submitted a draft of suggested revisions to the Committee. After several revisions, the final draft was recommended to the Legislature.
Although it focused upon Kansas needs, the committee followed guidelines set by other state drafting committees and the Model Penal Code published by the American Law Institute in 1962.
Wilson said such a change in criminal law was difficult because "people are apprehensive about relaxing standards or demonstrating softness."
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In addition to ambiguities and inconsistencies, several obsolete laws were also struck from the Code. The new Code repeals 610 sections of the old Code, replacing them with 226 new sections.
Wilson said many of the old statutes either overlaped or did not adequately cover all needs.
In order to obtain clearer interpretations of the law, the new Code contains precise and simple definition of each crime. These will be classified as various degrees of felonies and misdemeanors with a set punishment for each degree. This departs from the old Code, which gives loose definitions and significance to crimes
One of the most liberalized statutes passed by the Legislature deals with criminal abortion. Because it raised considerable controversy within the Legislature, the entire Code became known to many simply as "the abortion law."
The new Code allows a licensed doctor to perform an abortion if he feels a pregnancy will physically or mentally harm the mother, if the child will be born with a physical or mental defect, or if pregnancy results from rape or incest. Except in an emergency, three doctors, including the one performing the operation, must give written justification of the abortion.
The present law allows abortion only to preserve the mother's life.
Although the new law is broader, the punishment is harsher. Abortion is now a misdemeanor, punishable by a one-year maximum in jail or a $500 maximum fine. The new Code reclassifies it as a Class D felony, and sets a one-to-three year minimum imprisonment and $5,000 maximum fine.
Laws maintaining public peace have been revised to meet new
demands on law enforcement. These repeal obsolete provisions pertaining to unlawful assemblies, mob and lynch parties and definitions of law enforcement duties.
In the replacement of the old "mob and lynch" provision, "riot" is defined as "any use of force or violence which produces a breach of public peace, or any threat to use such force and violence if accompanied by power or apparent power of immediate execution, by five or more persons acting together and without authority of the law."
Rioting is a Class A misdemeanor, punishable by a maximum of one year in jail or a $2,500 maximum fine.
Any participation in an unlawful assembly, defined as "the meeting or coming together with four or more people to cause disorderly conduct or a riot," is punishable under a Class B misdemeanor by a maximum of six months in jail or a $1,000 maximum fine.
Remaining at an unlawful assembly after benig directed to leave by a law enforcement officer is a Class A misdemeanor.
If one is guilty of inciting a riot, defined as urging others to commit violent or forceful acts against persons or property, he will be punished under a Class D felony.
Voting rights is the major addition of the civil rights section. Discrimination because of race, color, ancestry, nationality or religion is now illegal for all schools, hotels and restaurants and public recreation facilities.
Beginning in July, this will extend to include voting rights and public services. Any denial of these rights will be a Class A misdemeanor.
Statutory rape will have the broader name of indecent liberties with a child or ward. The
age of the child has been lowered from 18 to 16 years. Although this law protects the child from all forms of sexual misconduct, it also gives grounds for the child's prosecution if he or she aggravated the act.
The crime will remain a Class C felony, punishable by a minimum of one to five years in prison or a $10,000 maximum fine.
Sodomy, originally classified as a crime against public morals and decency, will be a sex offense along with rape and indecent liberties.
The old Code defines it as an "abominable crime against nature, committed with mankind or with beast," but never specified the act itself.
It will be defined under the new law as "any oral or anal copulation between two persons who are not husband and wife or consenting adults of the opposite sex, between a person and an animal or coitus with an animal."
While Kansas still doesn't condone these acts, punishments of these offenses give evidence that they are more accepted.
Old time criminal laws finally 'passed' away
When the 1969 Kansas Legislature sliced the original Criminal Code of 1855, it threw out many old laws that had been around a long time—ones that no one paid attention to anyway.
For example, beginning July 1 it will no longer be illegal for anyone to put on "any sort of an exhibition that consists of the eating or pretending to eat of snakes, lizards, scorpions, centipedes, tarantulas or other reptiles."
Nor do those who enjoy a Sunday afternoon around the card table or watching cockfights have to worry about a misdemeanor charge.
If you were ever guilty of "maliciously or mischievously picking, destroying or carrying away apples, pears, peaches, plums, grapes or any other fruit" from someone else's tree, you will no longer be charged with petty larceny.
The owners of the popular
TGIF spots or pool and dance places probably will rest easier since the provision prohibiting owners to set up "a common gaming house or bawdyhouse," is no longer around.
If one feels like racing a horse on a public road, he may, although he would be wise to watch for the cars that weren't around when the statute passed in 1855.
It will also be legal to spit tobacco or any kind of sputum or saliva publicly in Kansas. However, don't do it on a train because railroads are no longer required to provide passenger spit-toons.
KUOK, with its record-playing marathons and dorm sponsored telephone talkathons will finally be doing it legitimately. The statute prohibiting marathons, walkathons and skatathons or "any other endurance contest," was passed in 1835, when activities such as these were popular but sometimes harmful to the participants.