They are called blue laws. Based upon my exhaustive (two minutes of Internet searching) research, such laws have their origin in puritan New England and were (or are) intended to regulate moral behavior and limit what could or could not be done on the Sabbath.
    I don’t know if requiring a special permit to allow a jukebox, live music or dancing is technically a blue law, but there are certainly elements of the requirement that seem puritanical. As the case of the South Portland City Council’s review of the Spring Point Tavern’s entertainment license demonstrates, there is a practical reason for the regulation: giving the city a mechanism to rein in a business that promotes a rowdy atmosphere (the council granted the license with conditions)
    But here’s the part I don’t get – what’s the deal with the dancing? An entertainment license that excludes dancing costs $50, but with dancing it is $200. I must be missing something because I don’t understand why allowing dancing cost four times as much as allowing music. Are we afraid women will start auctioning off spots on their dance card or “perform” in other ways?
    For some reason tavern owner David Cram decided he didn’t need to cough up the extra $150. Perhaps he felt it wasn’t cost effective or maybe requesting a “with dancing” license was asking for too much from an already skeptical council – but to me, if you’re going to book bands and have a jukebox you might as well go ahead and spend the extra 50 cents a day in case someone wants to dance.
    At the meeting, Cram told the council that there is no dance floor at the tavern, if that is true I’m curious what he calls the open room with no seats. Perhaps after a long day at work, most of his patrons prefer standing around holding their drinks.
    On the day of the meeting I stopped into the tavern to ask some of the patrons and employees about the pending action (I sent reporter Amanda Estes to the municipal meeting, keeping the “sit in a bar and talk to people” assignment for myself). Off to one side a man began playing air guitar to accompany the jukebox. Is that dancing? Then  a woman moved rhythmically from one end of the open-room-with-no-seats to the other. Was that a dance? To me it seemed more like a form of locomotion – but then what if the song “Locomotion” was playing? Then what is it?
    I began pondering.
    Is there an acceptable standard of degrees off center someone’s hips are allowed to sway or a minimum elapsed time before said hips can be brought back to center and out the other way? Can you tap your feet so long as your heel remains on the floor?
    What about hopping? Can you hop but not bop? What if the person is an exceptionally bad dancer and it doesn’t even look like dancing? What if it turns out they are simply waiting in line for the bathroom?
    What about enforcement? Has anyone been thrown out of a bar for doing the mashed potato? Is there a three-steps-and-you’re-out rule? Are we dispatching police officers to report Kevin Bacon to John Lithgow or is it up to management? If so, should the tavern hire a middle school principal in addition to a bouncer to make sure patrons are behaving themselves?
    What is the band’s responsibility in all of this? What happens if they accidentally rock the house? What if they do it on purpose?
    Is there an appeal process? Can someone bring in a grandparent to declare, “That’s not dancing! This is dancing!” then proceed to waltz around the chamber? Wouldn’t that be the best meeting ever?
    The more I think about this the more I think it really needs to be tested in court, but I don’t like the tavern’s chances if it makes it to the Supreme Court, that Scalia seems like a real stick in the mud. Or the city could come up with one entertainment license and charge everyone 75 bucks. Either way works for me. In the meantime maybe Cram should look into amending his license.