Laws Of The

Corporation of Randolph

(Randolph Recorder, Friday, January 30, 1835)

Be IT ORDAINED, By the board of Mayor and Aldermen of the corporation of the town of Randolph, that the following shall be the rates of taxation within the limits of the corporation for the year 1835.

Each lot in the town of Randolph shall be taxed one dollar.

Each free male over the age of twenty one and each slave over the age of fourteen years, shall be taxed fifty cents CAPITATION tax, payable the 10th July.

Every male between the age of eighteen and forty-five, shall be taxed three dollars each, Street tax, payable in four equal installments, say on the 10th January, April, July, and October.

Inn Keepers shall pay a tax of five dollars, payable the 10th day January.

Merchants and Grocers shall be taxed 33 1/2 per cent on the amount they pay State and county tax, payable the 10th January.

Tipplers shall pay a tax of fifteen dollars, payable 10th January.

Store boats at the landing, shall pay two dollars per day in advance.

Flat boats are allowed 24 hours at the landing free of wharfage; after that time for retailing or vending, they shall pay one dollar per week for the first two weeks, or three dollars for a month, or five dollars for six months, in advance.

Exhibitions, for which money is received, shall be taxed five dollars for each time they exhibit, and fifty cents fee to the Recorder of this Corporation.

Be it further ordained, That GAMBLING with cards or otherwise, shall be fined from five to twenty dollars for each offense; and in case of refusal or inability to pay, to be imprisoned from ten to thirty days in the county jail; one half the fine to be awarded to the informer --slaves for the same offence shall receive from ten to thirty stripes.

SHOOTING, (unless it is necessary to kill some animal) or blasting stumps, trees or logs, shall be fined from two to five dollars; slaves for the same offence shall receive from ten to thirty stripes.

Brawling, Fighting, Rioting, or Drunkenness, shall be fined from five to twenty dollars for each offence -- slaves for the same offence shall receive from twenty to thirty-nine stripes.

Vending Liquors in less quantities than a quart without license, or selling to slaves without a permit from their owner, shall be fined from one to five dollars for each offence.

Vending merchandise or liquors on Sabbath, (except stores to boats passing) shall be fined three dollars for each offence.

Loading or unloading wagons, carts, or drays on the Sabbath day without a permit from the Mayor, shall be fined for each offence three dollars.

Slaves offering to vend property not of their own manufacture without a permit from their owner, shall forfeit the same to this corporation, to be refunded to the slaves' owner on application for the first offence -- if slaves on a week day, shall be in possession of their owners' horse, wagon or cart, it is deemed a sufficient permit.

Dogs running at large without collars on their necks, are subject to be shot by the constable; and the owners of the dogs shot, shall pay the constable twenty-five cents each for shooting them.

Proud Sluts running at large, shall be killed by the constable; and the owners of said sluts, shall pay the constable one dollar for killing said sluts.

Persons causing obstructions in the streets shall be fined five dollars for the first offence, and ten dollars for each successive offence; and one dollar per day for the time the obstructions remain in the streets.

Persons refusing to perform any duty assigned them by the board of Mayor and Aldermen of this corporation, shall be fined seventy-five cents for each refusal.

No person shall be permitted to place cordwood on the flat boat landing, nor to make a rank of cordwood on the steamboat landing of greater length than twenty-four feet, nor to approach nearer each other than twenty feet, nor to place more than three ranks alongside of each other; breaches of this ordinance shall be fined five for the first offence, and ten dollars for each succeeding offence; and the wood subject for the liquidation of the fine.

The high Constable of this Corporation, shall be, by virtue of his office, overseer of the streets, master of patrols, wharf-master, and fire-warden; it is his duty to remove all nuisances or dead bodies beyond the limits of this corporation, to collect all taxes, fines and forfeitures; to serve all processes for infringements of the by-laws of this corporation, and enforce all the ordinances of this corporation.

All assemblies of slaves without a permit from their owner and the Mayor of this corporation, shall be punished with twenty lashes on each individual arrested.

It shall be the duty of the fire-wardens of this corporation to examine all chimneys, stoves, and stove pipes within the limits of this corporation; and if any chimney, stove, or stove pipe, be deemed by said fire-wardens and constable to be unsafe, or endangering the safety of property in the limits of this corporation; it shall be their duty to notify the occupant of the house in which said chimney, stove, or stove pipe is placed, to have the same removed -- and at the expiration of twenty-four hours, if the said chimney, stove, or stove pipe, shall be found still unsafe, it shall be the duty of the high Constable to summon a sufficient force to remove such unsafe chimney, stove, or stove pipe at the expense of said occupant.  It shall also be the duty of said fire-wardens and constable to take notice of all collections of shavings, or other combustible matter that may be found in any workshop or house, or contiguous to any house or outhouse, that they may consider a nuisance of endangering the safety of property, and notify the person owning or causing such nuisance or danger, to have the same removed forthwith; and if the same be not removed within twenty-four hours from the time of such notice, the high Constable shall summon a sufficient force to remove said nuisance at the expense of the owner or person causing such nuisance.

A side walk shall be allowed of eight feet wide out each side of each street of sixty-six feet wide, and on all narrower streets, a side walk of six feet wide on each of the same shall be allowed.

Obstructions in side walks, or hitching a horse in the same, shall be fined for the first offence fifty cents, and for each succeeding offence one dollar.

Stallions and Jackasses standing within the limits of this corporation, shall pay a tax of five dollars per season; and any person exhibiting them in the streets shall be fined five dollars for each offence.

T. ROBINSON, Mayor

DAN VAUGHT, Recorder

Randolph Jan. 22, 1835