The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1937-07-12
The Human
Side of the
News
BY EDWIN C. HILL
Copyright, 1887, by King Features
Svndinata IncA

but the law may CTeSpaSS II n
has poison ivy in his yard. TIL
village board of Sea Cliff, L. I
DEGREES that any citizen ALLOWING
the plant to grow within IL fee
of his boundary line will be subjec
to $40 fine.
If the burgher doesn't remove
it, the village will send a squad
of diggers to tear it up, at the
expense of the houSeholderS.
Not even the most sensitive
libertarian could have a good
word to say for poison ivy and
it's unreStrained meandering;
and fee simple in land isn't
quite what it was in the days
of barons of Runnymed e.
Blocked off in cities and in
neat suburbs like Sea Cliff, we
have to defer more to the COM
munity. A raucous radio, a ram
pageous dog, a sooty chimney.
an obstreperous child, Sweet
Adeline" and now poison ivy
must all pipe down.
There's plenty of law to sus-
tain the Sea Cliff Village Board.
Chapter VIII of the State SAM
tary Code gives village health
boards full leeway in curbing
poison ivy. They are empowered
to order its destruction, as Sea
Cliff has done.
X
At Trenton, N. j., on August
8, 1885, Justice Thomas w.
Trenchard, of the New Jersey
Supreme Court, ruled that land
lords were liable for afflction
of tenants by this weed, and
sustained a claim for damages
in a case thus induced. Sub
urban areas around great cities
are a growth, in their present
scope, of the last few decades.
The city man, moving to the
country, getting a patch of soil
all his own, begins to feel in
trenched against all the ravag-
ing forces of change and in
security.
AS Epicurus counseled, he has
reduced his universe to dimen-
sions in which he can be the
sole owner, operator and con-
troller. He is touchy about tres.
pass, either by neighbors, way.
farers or the State.
The State does intrude, more
and more, with building, plumb
ing and sewer regulations. Zon-
ing is moving ahead rapidly in
all well-regulated localities. The
control of insect pests-this be-
ing the start of the Japanese
beetle SeaSon-giveS the John
Laws another foot-thrust in the
door of EVeryman's castle.
1nStinctively, sometimes blind
ly, we are all fighting this SUBJ
tie and continuous encroach.
ment Of government. But, OBJ
viously, there are instances
where the intrusion is justified
this poison ivy mandate would
seem to be one of them.
Thoreau probably would have
4 been quite ready to go to Jail,
rather than sacrifice a leaf of
his own personal, individual
poison ivy. But we haven't got
Walden Pond to range around,
and we have to make a decision
as to what to resist in the new
ubiquitous State and what to
accept and sanction.
Blackstone more or less GOV.
cred the ground in his famous
passage on the two kinds of
laws. One kind, he said was Job
viously founded in eternal rea.
son and justice" and tie other
kind was based on a possibly
temporary urgency and subject
to modification under changed
conditions.
Here. in legal polemics, is the
take-off for fluidity and adapta.
bility of the law. The Sea Cliff
poison ivy cops will not run
afoul of the common law. The
idea is that a ranging mischief.
maker like this ought to be re-
strained like any other trouble
some prowler. That seems SEN
sible, and may be admitted,
without any concessions in other
instances in which State, Fed
eral and municipal government
are getting altogether too nosey.
x
Take a fragrant garden sub
urb like Sea Cliff and stack it
UP against a countryside which
has gone to the extreme of
laissez-faire and the advantage
seems all with the former. AS
to the latter, there's the red
clay country down around Way
Cross, Ga, where Henry Ford
is talking about putting in a
plant. Down there they Just
forget about lot lines. There are
few fences, and cattle range at
random. Needing meat, the
cabin dweller takes down an old
squirrel gun, steps down the
road a bit and knocks over a
steer.
Flea-bitten, f1op-eared dogs
just range around and get a
hand-out at any back door they
can, belonging to nobody in
particular. A man grows corn
on likely-looking land without
bothering too much about the
title. Thus, indifference to
property metes and bounds, and
common law restraints as to its
use, has brought about loose
communal living. There is in
this a considerable sense of