Phillips v. City of Boston

• Decision Date: 21 May 1903
• Citation: 183 Mass. 314,67 N.E. 250
• Parties: PHILLIPS v. CITY OF BOSTON.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

183 Mass. 314

67 N.E. 250

PHILLIPS v. CITY OF BOSTON.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

May 21, 1903

COUNSEL

Arthur Lord, for plaintiff.

Saml. M. Child, for defendant.

OPINION

BRALEY J.

This was an action brought by the plaintiff, as Treasurer and Receiver General of the Commonwealth, to recover from the defendant for the care and support as a pauper of Henrietta M. Melvin, a person of unsound mind, and never placed under guardianship. She was born in Boston in 1860, where her father, William Melvin, at that time had a settlement, and lived with him until his death in 1880, and then with his widow, her stepmother, until 1882, when she left Boston, and went to Quincy, and there lived continuously until her commitment, in June, 1893, to the 'Massachusetts School for the Feeble-Minded.' She did not during this time received relief as a pauper. The exceptions state that 'there was medical and other evidence which would warrant the court in finding that she was non compos mentis from birth, and the court specially found that said Henrietta during the time of her stay in Quincy, was non compos mentis and a fit subject of guardianship.' The only question presented for our decision is whether, by her residence in Quincy for at least five consecutive years, without receiving relief as a pauper, she acquired a settlement in that city it being conceded that, if she did not, then her derivative settlement from her father was in Boston. And this depends upon the construction of Pub. St. 1882, c. 83, § 1, cl. 6 re-enacted in Rev. Laws, c. 80, § 1, cl. 6; 'Any woman of the age of twenty-one years who resides in any place within this state for five years together shall thereby gain a settlement in such place.' Ordinarily, the word 'resides' may be construed as having a residence in a place, and to be there settled as a home, and in our laws relating to taxation, voting, and settlement of paupers has the same meaning as 'domicile.' While no exact and full definition to cover all cases can be given of the word 'domicile,' it was said in Lyman v. Fiske, 17 Pick. 231, 234, 28 Am. Dec. 293, that: 'In general terms one may be designated as an inhabitant of that place which constitutes the principal seat of his residence, of his business, pursuits, connections, attachments, and of his political and municipal relations. It is manifest, therefore, that it embraces the fact of residence at a place with the intent to regard it and make it his home. The act and intent must concur, and the intent may be inferred from declarations and conduct.' It is the settled policy of the law that for the purpose of pauper relief the domicile of origin continues until another has been acquired, and it must now be taken to be too well settled to admit of doubt that to...