92 
A simple definition of annexation points up the crux of the legal 
impediment in Massachusetts: 
Annexation is the addition of territory to a municipal corporation as an integral 
part. Generally, it involves joining ail or part of the territory of an unincorporated, 
less populous, or subordinate local unit to that of a larger unit, usually incor- 
porated, offering a more complete array of municipal services.1%8 (Xf 2 
In Massachusetts all local units are incorporated, and the question 
thus becomes whether one incorporated municipality may annex part 
of an adjoining incorporated municipality. The answer is to be found 
in the home rule amendment and in chapter 3.5 f and chapter 42, S 7 
of the general laws of the Commonwealth. 
In Massachusetts, as in the majority of States, no statute explicitly 
excepts incorporated areas from annexation proceedings, nor does any 
statute state that only unincorporated territory may be annexed. In 
fact, the only provisions of the general laws dealing at all with annexa- 
tion are chapter 3, S 5, and chapter 42, S 7. 
The first merely provides for uniformity of petitions to the general court for 
special legislation. The second provides that the department of publie works, with 
the concurrence of town meetings, may propose to the general court changes in 
town boundaries.!° 
Neither qualifies as any sort of enabling act providing procedures 
for annexation, and no case law seems to exist dealing with the impli- 
cations of the statutory silence with respect to annexation procedures 
in Massachusetts. 
Three other jurisdictions, however, have considered the legality of 
annexing incorporated territory in the face of statutory silence, and 
all three have denied the legality.1*° 
Tf the appellate courts of other States were called upon to answer the question 
of whether or not annexation laws are applicable to incorporated territory in the 
absence of an express prohibition thereof, there is more than a possibility based 
on experience in the above three States (of North Dakota, Wisconsin, and Texas) 
that they would void an annexation of incorporated territory. 
That conclusion is especially likely in Massachusetts because of the 
additional factor of the home rule amendment, under which each city 
and town, whether or not it has adopted a home rule charter, receives 
all the protections of the amendment.” 
Viewing the amendment from the perspective of the home rule 
powers granted, and not the protections afforded, one reaches the 
same conclusion. Even with respect to unincorporated territory. 
In most States having home rule provision . . . the courts have held that 
home rule powers do not add anything to a cities (sic) power to annex territory. 
General laws must still be looked to for such power. 
Massachusetts courts too are likely to reach that conclusion. Al 
though one State does permit a home rule city to annex even unin 
corporated territory on the basis of its home rule grant alone,™ the 
reservation of the boundary alteration power to the legislature in the 
home rule amendment itself,’“° the presence of only incorporated land 
188 Adjusting Municipal Boundaries, supra note 149, at 1. 
189 Tntermunicipal Relations, supra note 8, at 31. 
140 F. Sengstock, “Annexation: A Solution to the Metropolitan Area Problem” 42-43 (1960) (hereafter cited 
as Annexation), 
141 Thid. 
142114 Massachusetts Constitution am. art. 89, sec. 8. 
43 115 Littlefield, supra note 161, at 22. 
144 Thid. at 23. 
145 Massachusetts Constitution am. art. 89, sec. 8(4). 
