Case ID: mass_4/html/0396-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      Per Curiam.\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

The Inhabitants of Bath, Plaintiffs in Error, versus The Inhabitants of Bowdoin.
    Where the territory, of which a new town is composed, was before the incorpora tian an unincorporated place, the incorporation ipso facto gives every one inhabiting there a legal settlement. — But where the new town is formed from part of an ancient one, those settled in that place at the date of the incorporation are legally settled in the ancient town.
    This was a writ of error brought to reverse a judgment of the Court of Common Pleas of this county, respecting the settlement and support of a pauper. The suit was originally commenced before a justice of the peace, from which it was removed to the Common Pleas, who stated the following facts as the foundation of the judgment afterwards rendered, viz.: —
    “ That Mary Binkley, the pauper, was born in the town of Brunswick, July 19th, 1763; that in 1772, Gideon Binkley purchased an estate of freehold, in the town of Bath, and removed with his family (Mary, the pauper, being one) into the said town, in February, 1774, and continued, with the said Mary in- [ * 453 ] habitants of Bath, until the latter * part of February, 1781 ; that on the 2d day of February, 1781, the said Gideon sold his .estate in Georgetown; that on the 17th of the same February, the second parish in the town of Georgetown was incor porated into a town by the name of Bath; that in the latter part of the same February, the said Gideon, with the said pauper, removed from the town of Bath, and it does not appear that the said pauper has gained a settlement in any town since her removal from Bath as aforesaid.”
    The Court of Common Pleas adjudged the lawful settlement of the pauper to be in Bath, and ordered her to be removed thither, and that the town of Bowdoin should recover against the town of 
      Bath the sum of twenty pounds twelve shillings, for expenses in supporting said pauper from December 20, 1793, to April 5, 1795.
    The cause was submitted to the Court without argument.
    
      
       The Court must be understood to mean the territory which has since constituted Bath, which, at the time referred to, was part of Georgetown
      
    
   Per Curiam.

The proceedings whicli this writ of error is brought to reverse, were instituted at the suit of the inhabitants of Bowdoin, who demanded payment for supplies furnished to Mary HinJdey, a pauper, and also her removal to Bath, where they insisted that she was settled.

The only question before us upon this record is, whether the paiiper had a legal settlement in Bath. If she had, the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas is right, and must be affirmed ; if she had not her legal settlement in Bath, the judgment must be reversed.

The only facts which tend to show a settlement in Bath, are, that her father removed into that part of Georgetown which is now in Bath, in 1774, having a freehold estate there, and that he con tinned there until the latter part of February, 1781. Bath was incorporated into a town, by its present name, February 17, 1781.

If he acquired a legal settlement in Bath, it must have been gained either by habitancy, — but at that time habitancy did not give a settlement without a vote of the town, — or it must have been acquired by virtue of the incorporation of Bath. If the territory, of which the new town was composed, had before been an unincorporated place, the incorporation would ipso facto have given every one then inhabiting * there a legal settle- [ * 454 J ment. But such was not the case. That territory had before been part of an ancient town ; and every one legally settled in that place at the date'of the incorporation, must have been legally settled in Georgetown.

The case does not show a settlement of the pauper in Bath Whether she had a settlement in any other place, it is not necessary for us to inquire ; and if it was, the facts are incompetent to show it.

Judgment reversed

Memorandum. — At the last June term, at Wiscasset, Benjamin Hasey and Josiah Stebbins, Esquires, were appointed examiners of candidates for admission as counsellors and attorneys within the county of Lincoln.