blue law
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of blue law
An Americanism dating back to 1775–85
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
MERRILLVILLE, Ind. — It is still illegal to buy alcohol at a liquor store on Sunday in Indiana, a red state holding fast to an old blue law.
From New York Times • Dec. 23, 2015
This 68-year-old blue law, a relic of Anthony Comstock's crusades, is widely disregarded, seldom enforced.
From Time Magazine Archive
Ever since, every blue law seems inevitably to have picked up similar variations.
From Time Magazine Archive
The campus blue law also ruled that "mixed gatherings of men and women shall be restricted to public rooms on main floors."
From Time Magazine Archive
We had been assured by a newspaper friend that Washington was so full of inventors and blue law fans that if you "dropped a match anywhere a nut would step on it."
From Turns about Town by Holliday, Robert Cortes
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
