Ticer v. Thomas

McSiijerry, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. John B. Thomas, an unmarried man, and a resident of Charles County, worked as a laborer for different persons until the spring of 1889, when he went to the State of Ohio to work, and remained there until October following. He then returned to his brother’s house in Charles County, and remained until May, 1890, when he again left and went to Germantown Junction, to work on a railroad, hut he returned to his brother’s on October eleventh, 1890. He did not make the affidavit prescribed by sec. 14, Act 1890, ch. 573.

During the October sitting of the officer of registration, the name of the appellee was stricken from the list of qualified voters, and on October sixteenth, Thomas filed a petition praying an appeal to the Circuit Court for Charles County. On the same day a motion was made to dismiss the appeal on the ground that it had been prematurely taken. This motion was overruled, the case was heard, and the Court on the following day orderéd the reinstatement of the appellee’s name. The officer of registration thereupon appealed to this Court and the record is now before us.

There are four bills of exception in the record. The first and most important question is this: Was the appeal to the Circuit Court from the officer of registration prematxirely taken ? Thomas had been registered and had voted in Charles County before the adoption of the amendments to the registration law in 1890. Under sec. 9 of the Act of 1890, ch. 573, the officers of registration for the several counties are required to sit for three successive days in September, beginning on the third Monday, and for four successive days in October, beginning on the first Monday, and finally on the third Monday of the same month.

This last sitting is expressly ³⁴⁴ declared by the same section to be for “revision and for the hearing of applications for reinstatement by persons whose names shall have been stricken off.” On the first and second days of the September sittings the officers of registration are directed by sec. 19 to go over the lists carefully and “note for striking ****** the names of all persons, whom from their own information” they have “reason to believe to be proper to be stricken off.” They are then required to send duplicate notices to such persons, one by mail and the other by the sheriff, warning them to appear during the October sittings, and show cause why their names should not be stricken from the registries. If no cause, or an insufficient cause, be shown on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday of the October sitting, it becomes their duty on Friday (which is in fact the fifth day of the October sitting, though the 9th sec. names only four) to strike off the names of the persons so noted for striking and so notified. The officers are then required to send out to the persons whose names have been so stricken off another notice informing them that their names have been stricken off. „ On the third Monday of October, all persons whose names have been stricken off under the proceedings just indicated, may appear before the officer of registration and be reinstated, if entitled, or the officer may himself reinstate their names if satisfied that he erroneously struck them off. His action in such cases is not necessarily