other-especially of contiguous-states, their administration must be attended with confusion and conflict; and this has been demonstrated in the case of Massachusetts and New York, where the laws of settlement have developed upon quite diverse principles. Until recently a settlement once gained in Massachusetts could never be lost. It has been the boast of the commonwealth that every drop of Massachusetts blood carried with it settlement; so that the great-grandchildren of parents once settled in the commonwealth might be sent back from other states or countries into Massachusetts for support. The conditions of gaining settlement were, however, as will be pointed out, so severe that a large portion of the population never acquired it. In New York, on the other hand, settlement could be acquired on short residence in one place. It was also easily lost when one left the state, being annulled by an absence of one year. In the administration of these laws confusion was inevitable. The poor-relief officers of New York acted on the assumption that the laws in Massachusetts were similar to those in their own state; the Massachusetts officials acted on the converse assumption. A person in distress turning up in New York, who had lived in some Massachusetts town long enough to acquire settlement, under New York laws would be turned over to Massachusetts. According to Massachusetts laws, however, the person returned would not be a legitimate charge upon the commonwealth. On the other hand, Massachusetts officials, acting on the assumption that a person who had once gained a settlement in New York must always retain it, would return to New York indigent persons whose claim to support had according to New York laws expired.

the difference of policy pursued in the transportation of indigent persons to their places of residence or settlement outside the state. The Massachusetts state board has held that the jurisdiction of the state's officers ceased at the state line, and accordingly that the poor-relief officers have performed their full duty by transporting persons outside the state line, leaving the officials of adjoining states to defray charges of transport across their respective territories. As it happens, this strict interpretation of the state's jurisdiction has borne rather heavily on New York. Many lines of transportation into Massachusetts from the west and south passed through New York. Persons entering on these lines and becoming chargeable, though they might never have resided in New York a day, would be started in their return journey to some western or southern state, carried over the state line and dropped in New York, on the assumption that New York officials would "pass on." New York could not retaliate since there were no states east of Massachusetts from which immigration into New York took place. Naturally, therefore, New York objected to the policy, insisting that its own practice be followed, and that indigent persons be sent the whole of the distance to their destination wherever that might be.

Still another source of discord has existed between these two states. Immigrants bound for Massachusetts have landed in considerable numbers at the port of New York. Whenever such persons have become chargeable they have been sent back to New York. This was done for a time in accordance with an agreement entered into in 1869, between the Massachusetts alien commissioners and the New York commissioner of charities and correction. By this agreement immigrants entering New York through the port of Boston were returned to Bos

ton, and those entering Massachusetts through New York, to New York. A similar understanding existed between Boston and Rhode Island, and Portland. In 1877 the New York commissioner gave notice of withdrawal from this agreement, and entered a protest against a policy which threw back each year large numbers of dependent persons who had never had a residence within the state. Massachusetts, however, continued her policy of deporting unsettled paupers outside the state's boundaries and leaving them there to be passed on from state to state to their destination.

A conference of the state boards and officers held in New York city, November 12, 1879, brought out clearly these differences in policy and disposition. A paper in the Thirteenth Annual Report of the state board of charities of New York recites among other points settled at this conference the following :

1. The number of paupers deported from Massachusetts to this State is very large.

2. Massachusetts holds New York responsible for the support of persons, on their becoming dependent in that State, who have entered her borders from any part of New York, although the parties may have no settlement in New York, and may not have been there except as passengers in transitu for Massachusetts.

3. Railroad corporations of Massachusetts are required by statute to carry out of the State, or to provide for their maintenance, persons whom they have conveyed into it, on their becoming dependent, unless they have obtained a legal settlement.

4. While the benefits of a settlement in Massachusetts descend to the offspring through succeeding generations, the difficulties of acquiring it are so great as practically to deprive a large portion of her population of this privilege, and leaving them in a condition liable to be deported on becoming dependent.

5. New York is largely suffering from the paupers and vagrants deported from Massachusetts in consequence of the enforcement of her rigorous settlement laws.

6. While in New York paupers are removed only with their consent, and then to their places of destination, in Massachusetts no option is extended to them, but they are imperatively thrust out of her borders

7. Massachusetts holds New York responsible for immigrants on their becoming sick and dependent in that State, unless they have acquired a settlement, who landed at the port of New York, although their original destination may have been to some point in Massachusetts, thus claiming the advantage to be derived from foreign immigration without sharing its disadvantages.

8. The magnitude of the evils arising from the return of immigrants, settled in other states, to this State upon their becoming dependent, because of their arrival in the country through the port of New York, is such that, should the other states adopt the policy pursued by Massachusetts, the burden to New York would soon become intolera

ble.'

This was the way the matter appeared to the New York board, and it was certainly serious enough in aspect. In these paragraphs the charges against Massachusetts are stated pretty strongly,-Massachusetts, for example, did not of course hold New York responsible for the "support" of persons entering her borders through New York, but only left such indigent persons to be passed on by New York to their destination,—and there certainly was another side of the matter. It is difficult to think of any way in which Massachusetts could protect herself against the influx of needy and decrepit immigrants, except to return them to the port where they landed, and to the port which had collected commutation money or accepted a bond as a guarantee that the immigrant should not become dependent. As at this time the regulation of immigration at the port of New York lay in the hands of local officials at that port ; and as all the states in the Union were more or less concerned that the service at this port should be efficient and careful in admitting foreigners, one way of holding these officials to their trust was to return to them such immigrants as became paupers.

In 1892 the legislature of Massachusetts, having authorized the governor to appoint a commission "to

1 Thirteenth Annual Report of the State, Board of Charities of New York, pp. 276-7.

investigate the effect on this Commonwealth of the migration of dependent persons, paupers and criminals from other states," took occasion to urge upon Congress and upon the executive and legislative departments of the several states "the importance of adopting legislative measures and establishing a uniform policy in dealing with immigrants from foreign countries, and persons migrating from state to state who are dependent upon public or private charity, and are of idle, vicious or criminal habits." This commission has been authorized to report, but the report has not at the time of this writing appeared.

Enough has been said perhaps to justify the selection of these two states for study of the historical development of their poor-laws. Although adjacent states, the laws in each have developed quite independently. The records of the two states are full and easily accessible, and they cover a longer period than do the records of most states. The experience of both commonwealths is varied and instructive. And finally, we find developed in them side by side the two systems of administration—namely, administration by county, and by town-which have spread with about equal favor through the newer states of the Union. Practically the only variation from the one or the other of these systems is where the choice between them is made a matter of local option, as in Illinois, and so both systems thrive in one state. In general it may be said, however, that the county system has found more favor in those southern states in which any system at all prevails, and the town system more in the North.

It is hoped, therefore, that an examination of the records and statutes of Massachusetts and New York may not be devoid of interest even to those residing else