Future bright for fortunetelling in Vt. town
September 1, 2008 ST. JOHNSBURY, Vt. - Behold, the future is being revealed and it looks bright
for fortune tellers,
clairvoyants, tarot card
readers and anyone claiming to contact spirits in this corner of northern
New England.
Soothsaying might still be banned in some parts of the country, but St. Johnsbury has repealed the ordinance against peering into the future that it had on the books since 1966.
“When the ordinance was lifted, I actually felt a large weight lifting from my shoulders,” said Maria Pawlowski, a tarot card reader. “It was very oppressive to have to refrain from something that was as natural to me as breathing.”
Fear of fraud has prompted many communities to ban fortunetelling but critics say it’s not government’s place to decide whether such personal beliefs or practices are fraudulent.
Last year in Philadelphia, city inspectors shut down more than a dozen psychics, astrologers and tarot-card readers after discovering a decades-old state law that still bans fortunetelling for profit.
Also last year, Louisiana’s Livingston Parish made soothsaying, fortunetelling, palm reading and crystal-ball gazing illegal; a Wiccan minister filed a challenge to the law in federal court.