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the occupant in R.; that as to the residue of the farm, the relation of landlord and tenant did not exist by reason of the contract to cultivate on shares, so as to make it taxable to the occupant or tenant; that the part of the farm in R. and the part in W., were both occupied by the owner by reason of cultivation, and should be assessed to him in W., the place of his residence.1 In North Carolina the land is assessed to the owner in the county in which he resides, although divided by a county line, and even if they are distinct tracts, provided they are held under the same title deed.2

Persons. They are generally assessed in the district, town, or ward in which they reside for their poll-tax and their personal property. The question of domicile or residence, in these cases, is a different one from that discussed in Ch. IV. There the question related to the power of the State to tax persons and their personal property by reason of the property being situate, or the person resident, in the State. Here the question is not one of power, but admitting the power, the question is in what town did the legislature intend the property shall be assessed.

In New York the statute is: "Every person shall be assessed in the town or ward where he resides, for all personal estate owned by him," &c. This is a fair sample of the statutes under which the questions arise as to the place of assessment of persons for their personal property. As a general rule a party is to be taxed at his domicile. The apparent or avowed intention of constant residence constitutes the domicile. Where residence is looked to as a criterion, it is the dwelling-house, in contradistinction to any place of business, trade, or occupation. If he has more than one dwelling-house, that in which he sleeps will generally govern, and if the dwelling be partly in one place and partly in another, that in which he habitually sleeps will govern. Where the statute uses the word "inhabitant," the persons to be assessed are those who have a fixed habitation and home, the same kind of residence as would entitle a person to vote in a town. When the domicile is once established, it continues until a new domicile is acquired, or until there is satisfactory evidence of the abandonment of the former domicile." The facts in the case of Nichols were

1 State v. Jewell, 34 N. J. Law, 259; s. P. State v. Hay, 2 Vroom, 275.

2 Hairston v. Stinson, 13 Ired. 479.

3 Moore v. Wilkins, 10 N. H. 452; Preston v. Boston, 12 Pick. 7.

41 American Leading Cases, 735.

5 Ibid. 751, citing Abington v. North Bridgewater, 23 Pick. 170, 178.

State v. Casper, 36 N. J. Law, 367; Kellogg v. Oshkosh, 14 Wis. 623.

71 American Leading Cases, 747; In re Nichols, 54 N. Y. 62. See also Lyman v. Fiske, 17 Pick. 231; Thorndike v. City of Boston, Id. 244, and Sears v. City of Boston, Id. 250, for a full and able discussion of the subject of the taxable domicile.

that for several years prior to 1863, W. resided in New Haven, and owned and carried on a farm in that town. In April of that year he sold it to one Daggett, who took possession, and W. boarded with him until the December following. In June, 1864, W. was taken sick at the house of his brother-in-law in Oswego, and did not recover until the next October. He remained in Oswego until January, 1865. He was assessed in July, 1864, in the town of New Haven, for personal property, and the assessment was sustained.

While intention is one of the leading criteria of domicile, yet it cannot be changed by intention alone; it consists of facts and intention. If a person removes from the town of his residence, with the intention of never residing there again, he is still liable to assessment in that town until he leaves the State, but when a party leaving with such intention is still on his way to his new domicile on the day the assessment begins, he is not liable to assessment in that town;3 nor where he has removed, but returns temporarily on business, stopping at the hotel and registering his name as from the town from which he has removed, is he liable to be assessed in that town.

A person who had resided in Boston went to New Orleans to live, engaged permanently in business, married there, and had children. He came to Boston with his children, intending to remain there, purchased a house, commenced housekeeping, and sent his children to the public schools. His family remained in Boston two years, for his children's health, when he returned to New Orleans and continued his business. He styled himself as of New Orleans, and voted there. He came to Boston every summer and remained several months. These facts justified a verdict that he resided in New Orleans.5

A person in 1850, and for several years before, resided in a hired house in the city of New York, during the winter and spring, and at his country seat in the town of Flushing, Queens county, during the summer and autumn. In the winter of 1850, he was assessed for his personal tax in New York, and in summer for the same tax in Flushing. The court was of opinion that in the sense of the statute he resided in New York at the time of the assessment." Where a person residing in one school district on a farın, moved with his family to a farm in another school district, under a contract to carry on the

1 Stoddert v. Ward, 31 Md. 562.

* Bulkley v. Williamson, 3 Gray, 493; but see Mead v. Roxborough, 11 Cush, 562..

3 Colton v. Longmeadow, 12 Allen, 598.

▲ Wade v. Matheson, 4 Lans. 158; s. P. Briggs v. Rochester, 82 Mass. 337.

5 Cochrane v. Boston, 4 Allen, 177.

Douglass v. Mayor, &c. of New York, 2 Duer, 110; affi'd 51 N. Y. 12.

farm for a year, intending to make it his home for the year, and he continued two years after under a renewal of the contract, carrying on at the same time his own farm, and intending to return when the contract was fulfilled, he was properly assessed in the district to which he had removed. If the dwelling-house of a party is divided by the boundary line of a town, the portion of the house in which he eats, sleeps, and receives his visitors, is his residence, and he is to be assessed in that town in which this part of the house is situated.2

At his residence or domicile, the citizen is assessed for his poll, his personal property situated in the same town or district, and for all his personal property which has no actual situs, such as choses in action, stocks in corporations and negotiable securities, all of which follow the person. This is the rule under general statutes, such as that in New York.

As to personal property in the limits of the State, having an actual situs different from the domicile of the owner, it will follow the general rule, unless the statute direct otherwise.

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Where a tax is imposed on "money at interest," whether it be secured by mortgage or otherwise, it follows the person of the owner, and is taxable to him at his residence. A note given for the purchase money of land, secured by mortgage, comes within the description of money at interest, although it does not bear interest for a certain period, and is taxed to the mortgagee at his residence. Shares of bank stock are assessed to the owner at his residence, and the cashier of a national bank may be compelled to give a list of stockholders in his bank. And where the statute directs the owner of shares to notify the cashier of the bank of his residence, under the penalty of being taxed both at his residence and at the locality of the bank, this notice is not conclusive as to his residence, but he may be assessed at his actual residence. The object of the statute was merely to make the declared intention of residence a test of residence in cases where there was uncertainty as to actual residence."

In Rhode Island the statute directs all personal property to be assessed to the owners "in the town in which they have had their actual

1 Woodard v. Isham, 43 Vt. 123.

2 Judkins v. Reed, 48 Maine, 386; Chenery v. Waltham, 8 Cush. 327.

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* People v. Whartenby, 38 Cal. 461; 25 Cal. 603; 35 Cal. 282; People v. Home Insurance Co. 29 Cal. 533.

Hammersley v. Franey, 39 Conn. 176; State v. Manchester, 1 Dutcher, 531; State

v. Massaker, 2 Id. 564.

6 Newman v. Wait, 46 Vt. 689.

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abode for the greater portion of the twelve months next preceding the first of April." Under this statute the actual place of abode was construed to mean the town where the person has a home and family residence, irrespective of absences for business purposes; but where a party has removed out of the State before the period of assessment, he is not liable to be assessed, although he may have had his abode there for the period contemplated by the statute. And where a tax act goes into operation on March 31st, and the party is assessed in September of the same year, ascertaining the place at which a party is to be assessed under the statute, is not liable to the objection that such a statute is retroactive in its operation.3

The general rule is altered in many of the States as to certain classes of personal estate, and the personal property is to be assessed at its situs, or at the place where the business is conducted about which it is used, or in which it is invested.

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In Massachusetts, "all goods, wares and merchandise, or any other stock in trade, including stock employed in the business of any of the mechanic arts, in towns within the State other than that where the owner resides, shall be taxed in those towns, if the owners hire or occupy stores, shops, or wharves therein, and shall not be taxable where the owners reside." This statute applies to non-residents as well as residents of the State. A person living in one town and doing business in another, where he has a privilege in a counting room, and has goods stored, is not within the statute so as to be assessed out of the town in which he resides; nor does the hiring of a yard, storage and sale of lumber, and erection of a small building for the use of the employees in a town other than his residence, render the tenant liable in that town. Partners doing business in Boston as booksellers and publishers, having stereotype plates and paper stored in Cambridge, are not to be assessed in Cambridge for that property." Merchants who send goods to a manufactory not owned by them, to go through some of the processes of manufacturing, under a contract with some person who understands that process, are not liable to be assessed in the town in which the manufactory is situate, when it is different from that in which the merchants reside. So the renting of a hotel and conducting it in a town other than the residence of the lessee, does not come within the terms of this statute, so as to make

1 Arnold v. Davis, 8 R. I. 341.

3 Greene". Gardiner, 6 R. I. 242.

4 Huckins v. Boston, 4 Cush. 543; Leonard 5 4 Cush. 543.

Little v. Cambridge, 9 Cush. 298.

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2 Barker v. Potter, 8 R. I. 15.

v. New Bedford, 16 Gray, 292.
Loud v. Charlestown, 103 Mass. 278.
8 Lee v. Templeton, 6 Gray, 579.

the lessee liable to be assessed in the town in which the hotel is situated.1 The occupancy or hiring contemplated would seem to be one which gives the party entire control of the property for his own business purposes, and to be at a place where his principal business is carried on, and not at a place where he has an occupancy for a temporary purpose, or for a purpose which is a mere incident to his principal business. Where a person hires a store in a town other than that in which he resides, and has an agent who exhibits the goods for sale, and delivers the goods when sold to the purchasers in that town, the mere fact that the agent has no power of sale, and that all sales are made by the owner, does not take the case out of the statute; for such property the owner is to be assessed in the town in which the store hired is situate.2

A similar statute has received a like construction in Maine, where it has been held that the hiring of logs to be sawed at a saw-mill and paying the wharfage, does not make the hirer the occupant of the mill which is situated in a town other than that of his residence, so as to be assessed in the town in which the mill is situated.3

In

The assessment of persons and property whose location can be readily changed with reference to their situs in a particular town, must of necessity refer to the situs at some particular period. many of the States, by express words, the situs of the property, or residence of the person, which governs, is that on a particular day, as the first day of April, or the first day of May; in others, as in New York, when the assessors commence the performance of their duties on the first of May and continue them till the first of July, the courts have construed the statute to have reference to the period when the roll is completed, on the first of July, to ascertain the taxable situs of the person or property. It is the person's actual residence on the day fixed by statute or by construction, that is to govern the assessment. Although he may intend to remove, that is not sufficient; as when a party intended to remove, and had made a contract for the removal of his furniture, and on the first of May it was put on board a vessel, and he himself left a few days after, he was held liable to be assessed in the town from which he was about to remove on the first of May. And where a party rented a farm for one year from the first of April, in another town, to which he intended to remove and was removing, but was delayed in the town of his resi

1 Charlestown v. Co. Com'rs, 109 Mass. 270. 2 Gray v. Kittell, 12 Mass. 161.

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3 Campbell v. Machias, 33 Maine, 419; s. P. Ellsworth v. Brown, 53 Maine, 519.

Mygatt v. Washburn, 15 N. Y. 316; Bell v. Pierce, 51 N. Y. 12.

5 Cavnoe v. Freetown, 9 Gray, 357; Otis v. Boston, 12 Cush. 52.

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