The Great Kite Bust

The anti-kite law in the District of Columbia seemed a good idea when it was passed in 1892. Washington's utility wires were then strung overhead for kites to tangle in and possibly short-circuit. No one ever thought to repeal the law, although it was not enforced in recent generations.

Washington's Park Police, however, recently have grown almost neurotically literalminded about kites ever since an underground newspaper asked for a permit to stage a kiteflying contest. The Smithsonian Institution was then denied a permit to hold its annual kiteflying carnival on the spacious Mall between the Capitol and Washington Monument. Then when a local lawyer named Frederic Schwartz Jr. filed suit for kite privileges, the Park Police really cracked down. They arrested four kitefliers one weekend and eleven the next, using horses and motor scooters to enforce law and order on the grass. One sergeant leading a miscreant away was heard to bark: "The charge is kiteflying." (Penalty: a $10 fine for each offense.)

Such absurdity--in a city with one of the highest crime rates in the nation--finally moved Interior Secretary Walter Hickel to plead with Congress to junk the law. Meantime, a district court judge has put a strict construction on the old law, allowing that it applies only to Old Washington and Georgetown. Thus kites may be flown freely without fear of arrest in Rock Creek Park, Mains Point and other neutral zones.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.