The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1907-03-01
ID A LEGAL SENSE.
SQUIRE RENDERS An OPINION
~ AT LENGTH.
Hypothetical Question Looked at from
Many Points Of View and Finally
Made Clear to the Mind.

Squire Aspinwall, who had been a
Justice of the peace so long that the
Oldest inhabitant could not remember
the date Of his appointment, was a
man who always deliberated well be-
fore answering "a question. He. be-
lieved in weighing his words and look
ing at the matter from every stand
point before expressing ~ positive
opinion for or against. It once took
him 20 minutes to answer man who
had asked him how far it was, from
Pumpkin Center to New Brussels. The
guideboards gave the distance as four
miles, but the squire was not willing
to say offhand that they were right,
although he admitted that four miles
might be said to be approximately
correct. One day somebody put this
question to the squire:
IF you owned an apple tree which
stood so near the line between your
lot and your neighbours that some of
the limbs hung over the fence, would
your neighbor have the right to pick
the fruit which grew on the limbs that
projected above his property"
WELL" replied the squire, "thats a
question that has to be considered in
a good many ways, not sayin' that the
legal standin' of the tree amt clearly
fixed by statoot made and provided,
but as fer right and wrong there's
some things to be said for and some
against. Supposin' it wasn't the apple
tree, but a horse belongin' to me that
walked up to the line fence and stuck
his head over. Would my neighbor
hev right to claim the horses head
belonged to him? If so, an he got
tired feedin' the head for nothin' he
might put poison or somethin' in the
grass and by KILN the head kill my
part of the horse, too, whereas l
couldn't do nothin' to him because he
could claim that he only wanted to
kill his part of the horse and didn't
have nothin' agin my end, therefore,
there would natchelly be some doubts
in the mind of the jury, or, to wit, If
your hen comes over into my barn and
lays her eggs, do the eggs aforesaid
belong to me or have you the right
hereinbefore mentioned to come into
my barn aforesaid and gather the said
eggs to have and to hold for your
heirs and assigns forever? Or we
might put it still another way, viz, if
you owned a COW and she broke into
my meadow and her calf was born
there in the meadow aforesaid, would
the calf belong to me or to you? and,
furthermore, if the law decided that
the calf belonged to me and you came
and drove your cow home, .lettin' my
calf starve, could sue you for dam
ages? Which brings us back to the
fruit tree. S'posin' the law said the
fruit CROWN on. the limbs that hung
over the fence into your yard be-
longed to you, and I done something
to the tree that would kill it, or
sawed off the limbs that reached
across the fence, could you get dam
ages from me for destroyin' your
proputty?
COR we might even put it another
way yit, the same bein' that you plant
ed watermelon seed in your garden
and the vine growed through the fence
into my yard and melon growed on
that end of it, and you seen that it
was goin' to be mine when it got ripe
and refused to hoe around the roots,
and the vine therefore commenced to
die, could git out mandamus to make
you keep the weeds pulled and hoe
around the vine so my melon would
have the nourishment it needed to
grow big and git ripe? Or we might
go even further and say that owned
a sheep and that my sheep aforesaid
tried to break into your field and got
stuck half way through the fence.
Would you have the right to clip that
part of the sheep aforesaid and sell
the wool for your own profit? There
fore, we can only say that there are
circumstances which being unforeseen
leads to hypothecations that amt
strictly in accordance with the juris-
prudence laid down for the cases that
might, as it were,:. be held in abey.
ance." :. ..-.