CHAPTER 248 AN ACT TO AMEND CHAPTER 142 OF THE PRIVATE LAWS OF 1897, AMENDING THE CHARTER OF THE TOWN OF CARTHAGE. The General Assembly of North Carolina do enact:
Section 3. That said chapter 142 is further amended by striking out section 3 thereof and by inserting and adding after section 47  sections numbered as follows: Sec. 48 That the Board of Commissioners of said town of Carthage shall have full power and authority to condemn land for the purpose of draining the town or any part thereof or any of the streets and sidewalks thereof, and to that end they, their servants, agents and employees are fully authorized and empowered to enter upon, lay off. construct and maintain any ditch or other water-way over, across and upon any tands of any person or persons or corporations within or without the corporate limits of said town not to exceed one-eighth of a mile therefrom in any direction they may consider necessary; and the damages in such condemnation proceedings shall be assessed in the same manner and under the same regulations as those prescribed in section 29 of chapter 32 of the Private Laws of 1881, with the same rights of appeal: Provided, that no appeal to the Superior Court shall in anyway delay, hinder or prevent the laying out, construction, final completion and maintenance of said ditch or other water-way during said appeal. Sec. 49 The Board of Commissioners may take such measures as they may deem effectual to prevent the entrance into town, or the spreading therein, of any contagious or infectious diseases, may stop, detain and examine for that purpose all things and persons coming from places believed to be infected with such diseases, may cause any person in town believed to be infected with such contagious disease, and whose stay might endanger the public health, to be removed to some place within or without the town limits; may cause to be removed or destroyed such furniture or other articles which shall be believed to be tainted or infected with any contagious or infectious disease, or which there shall be reasonable cause to apprehend will propagate disease, and may take all such reasonable steps to preserve the public health as they may adjudge necessary. Sec. 50 Whenever an offender has been convicted for a violation of a town ordinance and a fine imposed, the Mayor of said town or other oflicer before whom he shall have been convicted, at the time of entering judgment, may order that on failure to pay the fine to the Constable of said town, or the officer having him in charge, such offender shall be by such officer put to work on the streets of said town for a time to be fixed by the Mayor or other officer rendering the judgment, not exceeding thirty days, when he shall be discharged. Sec. 51 Any and all persons who may be able to labor, who shall frequent said town and be found therein without any visible means of support, sauntering about without employment, or who shall be found sleeping at night, or spending the night in, or upon, the piazzas of the stores or the court-house in said town shall be deemed vagrants and guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by a fine not exceeding $50  or imprisoned not exceeding thirty days, said offense being cognizable before the Mayor, who may cause such person to be farmed out to work on the public streets or other public works of said town. Sec. 52 That tramps as defined and punished by section 3828, 3829, 3830, 3831 and 3832 of chapter 63 of The Code are subject to the same penalties, punishments and cognizance as vagrants as set forth in the preceding section. Sec. 53 That the Board of Commissioners of the town of Carthage shall have power to prohibit the interment of dead bodies within the corporate limits of said town, except in the cemeteries now used in said town. Said Commissioners shall have the power and authority to purchase and hold to them and their successors, within or without the corporate limits of said town, so much land as in their opinion they may consider necessary to be used by the citizens and residents of the town for the purpose of burying the dead, to be known as the cemetery; and said Commissioners are hereby vested with the control of all interments of the dead and to make rules and regulations, and to adopt ordinances in reference to the same. They shall have power to sell, upon such terms as may be agreed upon between them and their purchasers, lots in said cemetery to citizens and residents of said town and other persons, in their discretion, to make deeds to such persons in fee to be executed by the Mayor under his seal, reciting that said lots are to be held for burial purposes and no other; and the purchasers of said lots and their heirs and assigns shall have the exclusive right to said lots and no burial shall be made thereon without the permission of the owners thereof. That the proceeds of the sale of said lots shall be first appropriated to the payment of the purchase price of said cemetery, or in replacing such money as may have been devoted to said purpose, and then to the improvement of said cemetery. Sec. 54 The Commissioners shall have full control of said cemetery, make rules and regulations, and appoint such person or persons for the management of the same as they may deem necessary; they shall lay off said cemetery in lots of such size and dimensions as they shall think proper; number the same, fix the prices thereon and cause a suitable map of the same to be made and filed in the office of the Mayor; they shall also provide space within said cemetery for the burial of such persons as may not be able to purchase lots, and for that reason, or other reasons, be permitted by the board, or some persons authorized by it, to be buried in said cemetery: they shall grant or cause to be granted a burial permit for all deceased persons not owning lots in said cemetery or permitted to be buried on the lots of others, or otherwise permitted to be buried, and shall have discretion and power to charge a burial fee not exceeding $3  for each body buried, to be used for the purpose of keeping up and improving said cemetery. Sec. 55 The Commissioners shall provide separate cemeteries for the white and colored people of said town, and the fees paid and moneys accruing from the sales of the lots by the white people shall be used in the cemetery provided for them, and the fees paid and money arising from the sale of lots by colored people shall be used in the cemetery provided for them; both said cemeteries to cost not exceeding twelve hundred dollars. Sec. 56 That the real estate purchased for said cemetery and the burial lots and plots conveyed to individuals for the purpose of interment shall be exempt from assessment and taxation and from sale under execution. Sec. 57 That any person who shall carelessly _or_ willfully destroy, deface or injure any tombstone or other structure placed in said cemetery, or injure any shrub tree, plant or flower therein being shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction fined or imprisoned in the discretion of the court. Sec. 58 That the Commissioners of said town may cause to be kept in the Mayor's office of said town a record of vital statistics containing all births and deaths occurring therein and such other statistics as they may deem useful and necessary. Sec. 59 Said Commissioners, in addition to their power to maintain a system of water-works, heretofore granted, shall have power and authority to contract and pay for water to be supplied by other persons or corporations to be used for extinguishing fire or other useful or necessary purposes in said town.