Shaeffer v. Gilbert

Robinson, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from an order of the Court below directing the appellee to be registered as a voter in the ⁶⁹ Sixth Precinct of the Nineteenth Ward of Baltimore City. The facts are these: — The appellee was horn in Harford County, and lived there with his mother, until he was twenty-one years of age. He then removed to Baltimore City, and entered Morgan College as a student, and for the past seven years he has lived at the said institution, engaged in the prosecution of his studies.

During vacation he was employed as a waiter at the different summer resorts, and when the season was over, he returned to the college. While thus pursuing his studies, he has supported himself entirely by his own efforts. Once a year he has visited his mother who still lives in Harford County, remaining there each time two or three days. Upon his arrival at the age of twenty-one years, he was registered as a voter in Harford County, but never voted there; and several years after his removal to Baltimore, he got a transfer of his registration from Harford County, in the manner prescribed by the statute, and was registered as a voter in Baltimore City, and has voted in said city, and has never voted elsewhere.

Upon these facts, about which there is no dispute, the question is whether he is now entitled to be registered as a voter in said city? And this depends upon whether he is a resident of the city within the meaning of Sec. 1, of Art. 1, -of the Constitution, which declares, that “every male citizen of the United States of the age of twenty-one years or upwards, who has been a resident of the State for one year, and of the legislative district of Baltimore City, or of the county in which he may offer to vote, for six months next preceding the election, shall be entitled to vote in the ward or election district in which he resides. ” All agree that the word “residence” is, in itself, susceptible of different meanings. It may mean residence of a temporary or transient character, or it may ⁷⁰ mean one’s fixed and settled home, in the sense of having no other home or place of residence. Its meaning depends upon the object and purpose with which it is used and the subject-matter to which it refers.

When used in a constitutional provision, as a qualifiéation for the exercisé -of the right of suffrage, Courts of high authority have held it as being synonymous with domicile. Opinion of the Judges, 5 Metc., 587 . If domicile is thus used in its popular sense, as meaning one’s fixed and settled abode or actual home, as distinguished from residence for a temporary purpose, whether it be for health, or pleasure or some particular business, and not in its legal and technical sense, as meaning, the place where one intends to reside permanently, or for an indefinite or unlimited period of time, we see no objection in holding that domicile and residence prescribed as a qualification for a voter, mean substantially the same thing. But there is, it seems to us, a broad distinction between domicile, in a legal and technical sense, by which one’s civil status and the rights of persons and property are determined, and residence required by the Constitution as a qualification for the exercise of political rights. “Domicile” in a legal sense, has, as we all know, a fixed and definite meaning, and yet the word domicile is nowhere to be found in the Constitution.

In prescribing the qualification of voters and eligibility for office, whether it be Governor, Judge, Attorney-General, Senator or member of the House of Delegates, the person must be a “ resident ” or must “ reside ” for the time specified within the State or county. The object in thus prescribing residence as a qualification for the exercise of the right of suffrage, was not merely for the purpose of identifying the voter and as a protection against fraud, but also that he should become in fact a member of the community, and as such have a common interest in ⁷¹ all matters pertaining to its government. The framers of the Constitution were dealing with the question of residence for political purposes, and which although analogous in many respects, is not to be understood in the same sense as domicile in law by which the rights of persons and property are governed. S^fthe question is what is the meaning, and what is necessary to constitute “residence” as thus used in the Constitution?

Itdoesnot j mean, as we have said, one’s permanent place of abode, where he intends to live all his days, or for an indefinite or unlimited time; nor does it mean one’s residence fora temporary purpose, with the intention of returning to his former residence when that purpose shall have been accomplished, hut means, as we understand it, one’s actual home in the sense of