You need a License for a Lemonade Stand:sheepish police tell boys

The Boston Globe reports on why "restraining trade" is a way of life in Massachusetts:

They may have been squeezed out of the lemonade business, but two Salem boys say they are not bitter.


Dominic Serino, 9, and his neighbor, Ryan Decker, 11, were forced Saturday to shut down their lemonade stand at Salem Common after an employee of a nearby sausage vendor called police, complaining that the boys were hurting his sales.

The budding entrepreneurs had to call it quits, under orders by some reluctant police officers. The boys, after all, did not have a license, and rules are rules. The two packed up and trudged home. But they said yesterday that they remain fans of the sausage man.

The state tells you what you can do.What's with Massachusetts?Via Opinion Journal