After 147 years, California residents are now free to turn down law enforcement officials who ask for help with an arrest.

A law, the California Posse Comitatus Act of 1872 , had previously made it a misdemeanor , subject to a fine, for an able-bodied adult to refuse to help officials with tasks like apprehending an escaped prisoner or preventing “any breach of peace.”

But the law had almost never been invoked in recent years, experts said. A bill removing it was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Aug. 30, without an accompanying statement.

Here’s a closer look at the history.

Why did this law draw attention now?

Bob Hertzberg, the Democratic state senator who sponsored the bill, said it was just a matter of cleaning up the legal code, adding that the 1872 act was “from a bygone era.”