There are plenty of things you can buy in New York at 3:30 on a Sunday morning, but, strangely enough, take-out beer is not one of them. This, a lower-court judge in Brooklyn has ruled, is not just. <br />
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The judge, Charles A. Posner of Criminal Court, found that the state law banning the sale of beer from 3 a.m. to noon on Sundays was unconstitutional because it is based in religious beliefs – specifically Christian ones – and thus violates the separation of church and state. <br />
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"In the case at hand," the judge wrote, dismissing a misdemeanor summons issued to a Brooklyn shopkeeper named Abdulsam Yafee, "there is no secular reason why beer cannot be sold on Sunday morning as opposed to any other morning."<br />
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Read the full story at <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/25/nyregion/25judge.html"><strong>The NY Times</strong></a>
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