IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD ONE THOUSAND EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY-EIGHT.

AN ACT

FOR REVISING AND CONSOLIDATING THE STA TUTES AND LAWS OF THE PROVINCE.

Second Series.

BE IT ENACTED, BY THE GOVERNOR, COUNCIL AND

ASSEMBLY, as follows:

CHAP. 1.

All acts public.

Commencement

of date.

Publication

how evidenced,

Repeal or alteration the same session.

Revived by express enactment only.

Proceedings under old acts con

new.

PART I.

OF THE INTERNAL ADMINISTRATION OF THE GOVERNMENT.

TITLE I.

CHAPTER 1.

OF THE PROMULGATION AND CONSTRUCTION OF STATUTES.

1. All acts shall be deemed public, and may be declared on, and given in evidence without being specially pleaded. 2. The clerk of the legislative council shall endorse on every act the date of its passage, and the endorsement shall be held part of the act, and shall be the date of its commencement, unless otherwise provided.

3. Printed copies of acts published in the royal gazette newspaper, in Halifax, or purporting to be published by the queen's printer for the province, shall be evidence of such acts.

4. Any act may be altered or repealed during the session in which it shall have passed.

5. No act nor any portion of an act that shall be repealed, shall be revived, unless by express enactment.

6. Where an act shall be repealed in whole or in part, tinued under and other provisions substituted, all persons acting under the old law shall continue to act as if appointed under the new law, until others are appointed in their stead, and all proceedings taken under the old law shall be taken up and continued under the new, when not inconsistent therewith; and all penalties may be recovered and proceedings had, in relation to matters which have happened before the repeal, in the same manner as if the law were still in force.

Construction of acts; meaning

ral provisions.

7. In the construction of acts, the following rules shall of terms; gene- be observed, unless otherwise expressly provided for, or such construction would be inconsistent with the manifest intention of the legislature, or repugnant to the context, that is to say:

The words "queen" or "her majesty" shall include her majesty, her heirs or successors.

"Governor" and "lieutenant governor" shall include the governor, lieutenant governor or commander in chief, or person administering the government of the province for the time being.

"Sessions" shall denote the court of general or quarter sessions of the peace for the county or district, and "special session" shall denote a special sessions of the peace for the county or district.

"Justice" shall signify justice of the peace.

"Prothonotary" shall include deputy prothonotary.
"Clerk of the crown" shall include deputy clerk of the

crown.

"Jail" shall mean county jail, and where imprisonment is prescribed it shall mean imprisonment in the jail or other building within the county in which debtors may be legally imprisoned.

"Warrant" shall signify warrant under hand and seal. "Grantor" may be construed as including every person from whom any freehold estate or interest passes by deed; and "grantee" as including every person to whom any such estate or interest passes in like manner.

"Highway" or "road" shall signify a public highway or road, and may also include county bridges.

"Land," "lands," or "real estate," shall include lands, tenements, and hereditaments, and all rights thereto and interest therein.

"Goods" shall mean personal property.

"Issue" as applied to the descent of estates, shall be construed to include all the lawful, lineal descendants of the ancestor.

"Representatives" shall mean executors and adminis

trators.

"Wills” shall include codicils.

"Month" shall signify a calendar month, and "year" a calendar year; and "year" alone shall be equivalent to the expression "year of our Lord."

"Oath" shall include affirmations in cases where by law, an affirmation may be substituted for an oath; and in the like cases the word "sworn" shall include the word "affirm."

"Person" may extend to bodies politic and corporate as well as to individuals.

"Folio" shall mean ninety words.

"Sureties" shall mean sufficient sureties; and "security" sufficient security.

Every word importing the singular number only may extend to several persons or things as well as to one person or thing and every word importing the plural number only, may extend to one person or thing as well as to several persons or things; and every word importing the masculine gender only, may extend to females as well as to males.

All words purporting to give a joint authority to three or more persons shall be construed as giving authority to a majority of such persons.

Where a penalty shall be imposed, and no particular mode be prescribed for the recovery thereof, the same may be recovered in the name of any person who will sue therefor, in the same manner, and with the like costs, as if it were a

CHAP. 1.

CHAP. 1. private debt due such person, the nature of the offence being briefly stated, and where no particular mode of applying any penalty shall be prescribed, the same shall be paid, one-half to the person who shall have sued therefor, and the other half to the overseers of the poor for the place where the offence was committed, for the use of the poor thereof; and where a penalty, or part thereof, shall be for the use of the poor, it shall be paid to the overseers of the poor for the place where the offence was committed, for the use of the poor thereof.

The imposition of a penalty shall not relieve any person from liability to answer for special damages to a party injured. Appeals to the supreme court shall be allowed by justices of the peace, from every judgment given by them in all cases tried before them, in the same manner and on the same terms as are provided in civil suits, except where otherwise specially provided.

All penalties and forfeitures, not exceeding ten pounds, may be sued for and recovered before any two justices of the peace; but if incurred within the city of Halifax, before the police court.

Prosecutions for such penalties or forfeitures may be in the name of any person, or of any corporate body.

Where authority to make appointments to public situations is conferred, it shall include the power to fill up vacancies caused by death, resignation, removal, or refusal

to act.

Where power to make bye laws, regulations, rules or orders is conferred, it shall include the power to alter or revoke the same, and make others.

No bye law shall be enforced if repugnant to law.

When it is declared that any matter is to form a county charge, the expense shall be presented, confirmed, assessed, levied and collected with and by the same means as by law directed with regard to other moneys for county purposes. Where forms are prescribed, slight deviations therefrom, not affecting the substance or calculated to mislead, shall

not vitiate them.

If the day upon which an act is to be done shall fall on a Sunday, Christmas Day, or Good Friday, the same shall be performed on the day following.

Justices of the peace may administer all oaths, with regard to the taking of which no particular directions are given.

Quakers or Moravians, where an oath is prescribed, may, instead of taking the same, solemnly affirm in manner used in their religion; and such affirmations shall have the like effect, and render the parties taking them liable to the like penalties, if false, as attach to an oath.

When bonds are required to be given by a public officer, they shall be taken in her majesty's name when not otherwise directed.

All officers now appointed, or hereafter to be appointed CHAP. 2. by the Governor, whether by commission or otherwise,

shall remain in office during pleasure only, unless otherwise expressed in their commissions or appointments.

TITLE II.

OF THE LEGISLATURE.

CHAPTER 2.

OF EXECUTIVE AND LEGISLATIVE DISABILITIES.

bled to sit in

1. The following persons holding the situations herein- Persons disaafter mentioned within the province, by themselves or the Legislature. deputies, or by others in trust for them, or for their benefit, shall be incapable of being appointed to, or holding seats in the executive council, or of being appointed to, or of sitting or voting in the legislative council, or of being elected as members of, or sitting or voting in the house of assembly, viz: the judges of the supreme court, the judge of the court of vice admiralty, officers and clerks of the customs and of colonial and light duties, and persons concerned in the receiving or managing of any moneys to be collected under any of such departments, the postmaster general, and persons having a general control or superintendence over the department, the deputy postmaster in Halifax, and persons employed about the department there.

of offence.

2. The appointment, election, or return of persons dis- Penalty in case abled as hereinbefore mentioned, shall be void; and every person so disabled who shall take his seat as a member of the executive council, or shall sit or vote as a member of the legislative council or of the house of assembly, shall forfeit ten pounds for every day in which he shall so sit or vote, to be recovered in the supreme court.

offices of emolu

vernment not

3. After the dissolution of the present house of assem- Persons holding bly no person holding any office of profit or emolument ment under go under the provincial government shall be eligible as a mem- eligible. ber of the general assembly, unless within ten days pre- Proviso. viously to the holding of the sheriff's court for the nomination of members to serve in such general assembly, he shall resign such office of profit or emolument, and signify such resignation to the provincial secretary.

After dissolution of asscnd

no one in

office of emolu

4. After the dissolution of the present house of assembly bly no person holding any office of profit or emolument ment can hold under the provincial government shall continue to hold a seat in legisia seat in the legislative council, unless within thirty days Proviso.

tive council.