LEGISLATION.

Maine.

At the session of the legislature of Maine, held in January, 1829, forty-one public acts and sixty-five private acts were passed. The private acts are published and numbered separately; an arrangement which we hope may be imitated elsewhere.

Ch. 449. Militia. Upon the requisition of any commanding officer of a company, at five days notice, the selectmen of towns and the assessors of plantations are to pay, at the place of inspection and review, to each officer and member of the company belonging to such town or plantation, who shall then and there' perform military duty, twenty-five cents.

Ch. 446. Disputed Territory. 'If any person, not a citizen of the United States, or any person under the authority, or color, or pretence of authority from any foreign prince, state, or government,' exercise any acts of ownership or jurisdiction within the limits of the state, as described by the treaty of 1783, or claim right, or threaten so to do, such person and his abettors are to be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and are liable to be tried for the offence by any court having competent jurisdiction, in any county within this state, and shall be punished by fine and imprisonment at the discretion of the court, according to the nature and aggravation of the offence.'

Ch. 418. Witnesses. Persons who have been stockholders of any bank in the state, after the transfer of their stock therein, are to be deemed competent witnesses for or against the bank.

Ch. 441. Justices of the Peace. Justices of the peace, whose commissions have expired or may expire, and shall not be renewed, are authorized to issue and renew executions on judgments and recognisances, by them rendered or taken while in commission; but this authority is not to continue beyond the term of two years from the expiration of their commissions.

Ch. 443. They are authorized to hear and determine 'any action of replevin, for the replevying any goods and chattels, not exceeding the value of twenty dollars.'

Ch. 448. If any justice of the peace dies or removes from the state, without recording and signing any judgment rendered by him, and his docket, the original writ, and the executions returned are deposited in the office of the clerk of the judicial courts of

the county within which he had jurisdiction, the clerk, when requested, is to make out and certify copies of the original writ and execution, if any issued, which copies shall be deemed sufficient evidence to maintain an action of debt thereon;' provided the clerk shall also certify that the docket was kept in legal form, and that the action was duly entered. If any justice of the peace neglects, for sixty days after the rendition of any judgment, to make up and sign a record thereof, he is to forfeit a sum not exceeding $100, nor less than $20, to the use of any person suing therefor, and he is further liable for all damages sustained by reason of such neglect.

Ch. 442. Foreign Attachment. Any persons, body politic or corporate, entitled to any personal action (except such as are excepted by "An act concerning foreign attachment,") against any person or persons, body politic or corporate, having any goods, effects, or credits so entrusted or deposited with any other body politic or corporate, (except counties, towns, and parishes) that the same cannot be attached by the ordinary process of law,' may cause them to be attached by process of foreign attachment; the corporation may appear by attorney or agent and make disclosure, and such disclosure is to be in writing and sworn to by the attorney or agent.

Ch. 431. Attachment. The estate, right, title, and interest, which any person has by virtue of a bond or contract in writing, to a conveyance of real estate,' upon conditions to be performed, may be taken by attachment, and may be seized and sold on execution, in the same manner as an equity of redemption and a similar right of redeeming is reserved to the debtor. The purchaser may, by bill in equity, compel the obligor or contractor to convey, upon performance of the conditions. If the obligor or contractor refuse to give information of the conditions remaining unperformed, on the part of the obligee or holder of the contract, the purchaser may maintain his bill, without offering to perform them, and may pray in his bill for a discovery thereof; and the respondent is required to disclose all matters duly prayed for therein. If an assignment by the obligee or person entitled to a conveyance, made previously to the attachment, is pleaded or disclosed, and the complainant put in issue its validity, the court is to cause the person so disclosed as assignee to be made a party to the bill, and, after notice to him, the issue is to be tried by a jury; if the assignment is found to be fraudulent, it is not to operate as a bar to the conveyance.

Ch. 444. Courts. The Supreme Judicial Court is to have original and concurrent jurisdiction with the Court of Common Pleas, in actions of assumpsit, debt, trespass, or case, where the damages demanded exceed $300. If the plaintiff, in an action commenced in the Supreme Court, fail to recover so much as

$100 as damages, he is not to recover costs; but the provision as to costs is not to apply to actions between towns.

'No stipulation, except in actions of replevin or trespass quare clausum fregit, and real actions, reserving the right to wave the pleading or statement of the case made in the Court of Common Pleas,' is to be allowed; but the Supreme Court may order amendments or a repleader.

Ch. 440. Divorces. Divorces are to be decreed, in case either of the parties wilfully desert the other without cause, for the term of five years, or join and continue with the Society of Shakers, separate from the other party, for that term, or is confined in the state's prison, for that term. If it appear that the desertion or joining the Shakers was by collusion; or if the application is made by the party deserting, or joining said society, or confined in prison; or if the parties have cohabited together after said term of time, which shall be the alleged cause of divorce, no divorce is to be decreed; but no divorce on account of any of these causes is to bar the issue from inheriting. The same provision is to be made in favor of the libellant, as in the case of divorce for adultery. If a divorce for these causes is decreed on the application of the wife, she is to be entitled to her dower.

Ch. 436. Licenses. Selectmen of towns and assessors of plantations are to deliver to each innholder and retailer, by them licensed, the names of intemperate persons; and every innholder or retailer who shall sell spirituous liquors to any such person, is to forfeit $5 for every offence. Innholders are to keep a printed copy of the act posted up in some conspicuous place in their houses; retailers and victuallers in their shops.

Ch. 423. Temperence. Innholders, retailers, and victuallers are not to furnish any spirituous liquors to any person known to them to be a non-commissioned officer or soldier, in the service of the United States, within five miles of any military post in this state, or to any such officer or soldier on duty, beyond the distance of five miles from any such military post, without a permit from the commanding officer of the corps to which he belongs, under penalty of forfeiting $10 for every offence; provided the commanding officer cause to be posted up, in the office of the clerk of the town or plantation, wherein such innholder or retailer resides, a list of the names of the non-commissioned officers and soldiers of his corps.

Ch. 430. Crimes. Robbers, burglars, persons convicted of rape, or carnal abuse of females under the age of ten years, and their accessaries before the fact, are to be punished by confinement to hard labor in the state's prison for life. Incendiaries, by whose agency any dwelling house shall be burnt in the night time, with their accessaries before the fact, are to suffer the pun

ishment of death. Jailors, voluntarily suffering any prisoner charged with a capital felony, to escape, are to be punished by fine, not exceeding $1000, and by confinement to hard labor in the state's prison for a term not less than five years, nor more than fifteen; if the escape is suffered after the prisoner has been convicted, the confinement is to continue for life.

Ch. 433. If any person, indicted for any offence, is acquitted as to part of the indictment, and convicted as to the residue, the verdict may be accepted and recorded, and he may be adjudged guilty of the offence, if any, which shall be substantially alleged in the residue of the indictment, and punished accordingly.

Ch. 420. Burying Grounds. This act enables persons to incorporate themselves, for the purpose of purchasing lands for burying grounds and repairing the fences enclosing the same. They are to apply to any justice of the peace in the county where they reside; who is to issue his warrant to one of the applicants, directing him to notify the applicants personally to meet for the purpose of incorporating themselves as a body politic; when assembled, they are to choose proper officers, and thereupon are to become a body politic, and to be known by such name as they may adopt. Every such body politic, within one year after its organization, is to erect a fence around the burying ground belonging to it, and keep it in good repair; in case of neglect, it is to pay a fine of $100, to be expended in erecting and repairing the fence.

Private and Special Acts. Among the private acts we notice six acts for the incorporation of mutual fire insurance companies; five acts for the protection of pickerel, alewives, &c. in certain places; five acts incorporating manufacturing companies; acts, incorporating two agricultural societies, two academies, a stage company, 'The Kennebec Ferry Company,' "The Master, Wardens, and Members of Fraternal Lodge,' a Society for the relief of the indigent widows and children of deceased congregational ministers, two banks, and two companies for erecting bridges.

We also notice an act to assess a tax of $50,000, which exempts the property of literary and charitable institutions from taxation; persons residing in any town as students in literary seminaries, and Indians, are also exempted.

New Hampshire.

At the session of the Legislature of New Hampshire, held in June, 1829, twenty-nine public acts, forty-eight private acts, and eighteen resolutions, were passed. A digest of all the public statutes could not be compressed within reasonable limits. It is our object, therefore, in the following abstract, to select the most important and interesting provisions. A large proportion of these acts are revisions of the former laws.

Salaries. The Governor is to receive, for his salary from June 1829 to June 1830, the sum of $1200; the Secretary, $800; the Treasurer, $600; the Adjutant General, $400. Members of the Council are to receive $2 a day, during the session of the general court, $2 50 if called together during the recess thereof, and 10 cents a mile for travel. The pay of the President of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives is $250 a day, during the session of the General Court, and 10 cents a mile for travel; and the pay of the members thereof is $3 a day, during the session, and 10 cents a mile for travel.

Ch. 45. Coroners. This act prescribes the general duties of coroners. No inquest is to be taken, except by the consent, in writing, of the majority of the selectmen of the town in which the dead body is found. The jury of inquest is to consist of 'three reputable freeholders, one of whom shall be a justice of the peace.'

Ch. 18. Sheriffs. This act prescribes the general duties of sheriffs and their deputies, and appears to be a revision of the former laws on this subject.

Ch. 26. Judges of Probate. If the judge of probate of any county is interested in an estate, under administration in such county, as heir or legatee, the account of the executor or administrator is to be rendered before the judge of probate of an adjoining county, and settled by him. If the executor or administrator of an estate is appointed judge of probate for the county, in which said estate is administered, before the same is fully settled,' 'all matters and things,' relating to the administration thereof are to be determined by the judge of probate of an adjoining county.

Ch. 36. Public Notaries. Public notaries are to be commissioned, for the term of five years, and are subject to be removed by the senate, upon impeachment, or by the Governor with the consent of the council, on the address of both houses of the legislature. They are authorized to take depositions and acknowledgments of deeds, &c. If any public notary in the state'ceases practising therein,' his records and papers are to be deposited in the office of the Secretary of State. If they are not so deposited, the Secretary of State is authorized to demand and receive them of the person, in whose possession they may be; and if such person refuse to deliver them, he is to forfeit the sum of $1000, one moiety thereof, to the use of the person suing for the same, the other moiety to the use of the county, of which the notary was last an inhabitant. Copies, certified by the Secretary of State, under the seal of the state, are to have the same effect as if certified, under the seal of the notary.

Ch. 62. Executions. This act is a revision of the former laws, prescribing the mode of levying executions upon real and personal

estate.