6 N.Y.S. 73 | N.Y. Sup. Ct. | 1889
The action was by the superintendent of the poor of the county of Seneca against the overseer of the poor of the town of Macedón, in Wayne county, to recover the expenses incurred by the former county in furnishing temporary relief to the family of one H. E., then and for nearly a year before that time resident in the town of Tyre, in Seneca county. H. E. came from Macedón, where he had lived two years, during which time, and while in Tyre, until bis application for the relief above mentioned, he had always supported himself and his family by bis labor. At the time of that application his wife had just died, after giving birth to twin boys. He had no accumulated property, and found himself without means to bury his wife and provide for the immediate wants of his six children, the eldest of whom was twelve years of age. The plaintiff, as superintendent of the poor of Seneca county, having furnished the needed temporary assistance, served upon the predecessor in office of the defendant, as overseer of the poor of Macedón, a notice in which he described H. E. and his children as seven paupers, who had come or strayed, or been improperly sent or brought, from the town of Macedón, in Wayne county, into the county of Seneca, without legal authority or right, with the effect and intent to make the county of Seneca chargeable with their support. And he notified the defendant’s predecessor forthwith-to take charge of such paupers, and remove them to his town and county, and pay the expense of such notice and of the support of said paupers. The defendant’s predecessor responded by denying “the supposed improper removal of II. E. and his six infant children, in the manner and with the intent alleged i.n said notice, ” and the plaintiff thereupon brought this action, alleging in his complaint that H. E. was a pauper when he “came or strayed, or was improperly brought, ” from Macedón to Tyre. The fault of the plaintiff’s -case, as made on the trial, was that the last-mentioned allegation was not only not established, but was admitted to be false. When H. E. removed from Macedón he was not a pauper, and never had been. He ivas a self-supporting citizen of Wayne county, with as good a right to select his residence,
Two things are made entirely clear by the provisions of the statute so far quoted: First, that the question of the settlement of any poor person or pauper is to be considered, in determining the question of liability for his support, only as between two towns of the same county which are liable for the support of their own poor, or as between such a town and the county to-which it belongs; and, second, that every poor person who has not a settlement in some town of the county in which he becomes poor must be supported or relieved at the expense of that county; and we shall see that these-rules are not changed by subsequent provisions of the statute, even as amended by modern and short-lived legislation. Section 58 of the same title (1 Rev. St. 628) defines a misdemeanor. It consists of transporting, removing, or enticing to remove, any poor person from any city, town, or county to any other city, town, or county, without legal authority, and there leaving such poor person, with intent to make the city, town, or county to which he is so removed chargeable with the support of such pauper. The section also imposes a penalty for such act, to be recovered by the overseers of the poor of the to wd,
