In Colombia, where reality often outdoes fiction and bureaucracy ages like boxed wine, there exists a series of strange laws that, though forgotten by time, common sense, and even Congress, remain legally binding. They are like legal zombies: no one knows exactly why they’re there, but no one dares to bury them completely.
One might think laws should be coherent with the current context, practical, or at least understandable. But Colombia–a magical land where a president can govern from a ranch and a donkey can win a symbolic mayoral election–has also produced a set of regulations that seem pulled from a legal comedy scripted by Kafka and directed by Gabriel García Márquez in a sleepless state.
Law 66 of 1874: ‘Reduction and civilization’ 19th century style
An infamous relic is Law 66 of 1874, which ordered–with all the colonial shamelessness of the language of the time–the “reduction and civilization of the indigenous groups.”
This statute considered the native peoples as perpetual minors, in need of moral and Christian guardianship, as if they were mischievous children lost in the jungle.
Fortunately, the 1991 Constitution brought some sense to the matter, declaring Colombia to be a “pluricultural and multiethnic” country.
Though repealed, such an infamous text, forgotten at the National Printing Office, helps us understand some of Colombia’s secular problems: a nation forged by the descendants of the colonizers against the pre-Columbian ethnic groups, denying–and when not denying, ridiculing–their cultural and identity contributions.
Because, hard as it may be to believe, the Colombian state saw its indigenous people as a problem to “civilize,” as if the Quimbaya had needed etiquette lessons from the Bogotá aristocracy.
Law 62 of 1887: A canal with no Chinese labor force
The famous Law 62 of 1887, a legislative gem enacted when Panama was still a Colombian department, was drafted when the dream of an interoceanic canal was simmering amid tropical sweats and yellow fever.
This law prohibits the “importation of Chinese for any work in Colombian territory.” Beyond the troubling use of the term “importation” to refer to people–which borders on language associated with human trafficking, and is clearly at odds with the Constitution–the article effectively barred Chinese workers from being employed in Colombia.
Although the law technically remains in force, as it has never been repealed, the fact that major public works—such as the Bogotá subway—are being built by a consortium of Chinese companies makes it clear that this law has been left to gather dust in a forgotten drawer.
Moreover, the Petro administration’s efforts to strengthen commercial ties with Xi Jinping’s regime highlight how little memory remains in Colombia of the fact that, 138 years ago, the government actively opposed the involvement of Chinese workers in building the infrastructure project that would go on to transform global trade.
Law 85 of 1916: Suspension of citizenship for drunkenness in Colombia
With this law, now formally repealed, the state proposed suspending citizenship from individuals found in a state of drunkenness.
The text lists grounds for temporarily suspending someone’s citizenship, thereby preventing them from being elected to public or political office.
Among the reasons the text gave for suspending Colombian citizenship was “habitual drunkenness,” meaning frequent intoxication, something that enabled the suspension of rights for multitudes of people.
The same regulation stated that all those who could not read or write or who lacked an annual income of three hundred pesos or real estate worth one thousand pesos must be excluded from the electoral census.
Bogota’s Agreement 1 of 1918: ‘Begging? No, sir—it’s illegal!’
We can wrap up this parade of bizarre legalities by mentioning the glorious Agreement 1 of 1918 from the Bogotá Council, which prohibited begging. Because obviously, if you’re hungry and homeless, the logical solution isn’t to seek help—it’s simply not to beg. As if poverty were a bad habit that could be corrected with a fine.
“The practice of begging is hereby prohibited,” stated the Agreement, as if banning smoking on public transit. The regulation sought to clean up downtown Bogotá’s streets—not through social programs or job integration, but with moral and administrative penalties.
As though poverty were a crime rather than a symptom of the country’s structural inequalities. The rule quickly became obsolete in practice, yet it wasn’t formally repealed until just a few years ago.
Decree 609 of 1955: ‘Protecting children from foreign magazines’
Another legal regulation–at the very least curious–is the now obsolete Decree 609 of 1955. It aimed to protect children from corruption and harmful influences allegedly found in foreign children’s magazines and comic books, claiming they “pose serious dangers to the healthy development of children and adolescents.”
To achieve effective child protection, the decree removed from circulation “all children’s publications that tend to distance the child’s mentality from reality without solidly enriching their imagination.” It also established a board to review publication content.
Given the accessibility of the internet, mobile phones, and even artificial intelligence, the decree presumably had little to no effectiveness—even by 2020.
Colombia and the elimination of strange laws
During the pandemic five years ago, Colombia moved to formally eliminate the strangest past laws that, due to decades of non-enforcement, had fallen into obscurity.
A bill promoted by the Ministry of Justice sought to eliminate over 10,000 regulations then considered anachronistic. The text was approved by the full House of Representatives in 2019.
Thanks to this legislative act, beyond the aforementioned regulations, texts like the one stating “‘anyone without work who cannot provide valid justification is considered a troublemaker’” were eliminated.
Indeed, five years ago, countless regulations, laws, and decrees were formally repealed due to disuse and—as seen in the examples above—because they belonged, thankfully, to another era.