Sodomy law: New Jersey, May 30, 1668
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The representative assembly of New Jersey, meeting for the first time, made "sodomy" and "buggery" capital offenses.[1]
The wording of the New Jersey sodomy statute was almost identical to the "Duke's Laws" of New York. As in New England at this time, children under fourteen and the victims of force were exempted from the death penalty, but were to be punished according to the court's discretion.
The New Jersey sodomy law was next revised in 1681.
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References
- ↑ Jonathan Ned Katz, Gay/Lesbian Almanac (NY: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 106, citing Aaron Leaming and Jacob Spicer, eds., The Grants, Concessions, and Original Constitutions of the Province of New Jersey (Philadelphia: W. Bradford, 1758), pp. 77, 79.
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