PARK AND CEMETERY. 
‘208 
QUESTIONS OF 
Benjamin F. Scoville, who was re- 
cently for the second time fined $5 for 
violating rules of New London Cem- 
etery Association, New London, 
Conn., by working in Cedar Grove 
Cemetery, refused to pay his fine and- 
was sent to jail. . 
Scoville was fined some years ago, 
and refused to pay. An officer of the 
cemetery association paid him out. 
This time he had been warned both 
by Judge Coit and the association’s 
officers to cease working around the 
lot in the cemetery, but in spite of the 
previous court decision, persisted in 
violating the cemetery rules. 
^ ^ ^ 
W. A. Simpson, chairman of the com- 
mission appointed by the secretary of 
the interior department at Washington 
to remove the bodies from Huron Cem- 
etery, Kansas City. Kan., and sell the 
ground, appeared before the city council, 
and made a formal offer to sell the cem- 
etery to the city for $70,000. 
Mrs. Lyda Conley, who recently tried 
to enjoin the sale of the cemetery and 
was denied an injunction, informed the 
mayor and council that she intended 
filing an amended petition and asked that 
no action be taken on Mr. Simpson’s 
offer at present. It was decided not to 
do anything in the matter until the 
courts finally settle the controversy. 
* * * 
The case of W. J. Townsend vs. the 
Beatrice Cemetery Association of 
Beatrice, Neb., garnishment proceed- 
ings, which has been on trial before 
Judge Cobbey in that city has been 
adjourned to permit Judge Cobbey to 
secure instructions from Judge Mun- 
ger of the Federal Court. The case is 
one which has been occupying the at- 
tention of the District and Federal 
courts for the last ten years. Town- 
send. a capitalist of Glens Falls, N. 
Y., secured a judgment against the 
cemetery association for about $8,000. 
H. J. Dobbs, his attorney, recently be- 
gan garnishment proceedings against 
J. S. Rutherford, the treasurer of the 
association, to secure possession of 
funds alleged to be in the hands of 
the Beatrice National Bank. The 
original debt of the association was 
about $0,000. The sum of $5,400 in- 
terest has been paid on it and judg- 
ment has been rendered in the Fed- 
eral Court against the association for 
the amount claimed with interest. 
The Federal Court at St. Louis con- 
firmed Judge Munger’s decision al- 
lowing the judgment against the as- 
CEMETERY LAW 
sociation, but said that it was not a 
lien against the land and was not sub- 
ject to execution. The court also re- 
fused to appoint a receiver for the 
association. 
* * * 
Notice has been served on Mayor 
Sanderson of Springfield, Mass., by 
attorneys for Mrs. Louise Viner of 
Bridgeport, Conn., requesting that the 
city consult her before any disposi- 
tion is made of the Long Hill ceme- 
tery land. She seems to be the sole 
surviving heir of the original owner. 
It is claimed that the land was first 
conveyed for cemetery purposes 
about sixty years ago, with the stipu- 
lation in the deed that if the land 
ceased to be used for such purposes 
it was to be given back to the original 
grantor or his heirs. The matter is 
in the hands of the city property com- 
mittee. It was supposed when the 
city secured the land under special 
enactment from the legislature that 
there was no remaining heir to the 
original grantor. It is expected to 
use the land for school purposes. 
^ 
The Circuit Court at Miamisburg, 
O., in a decision in the case of Wil- 
liam H. Pansing vs. The Village of 
Miamisburg, whereby the village 
sought to condemn the old cemetery 
along the canal on Central avenue 
held that the resolutions and ordi- 
In New York, as in most other 
large and rapidly growing cities, there 
is a constant effort on the part of 
real estate speculators to get posses- 
sion of the cemeteries located within 
the city limits. When cemeteries are 
controlled, as many of them are, by 
private or semi-private corporations, 
the contest usually ends by the re- 
moval of the bodies and the sale of 
the land for building purposes. In 
Manhattan (N. Y. City) alone dozens 
of the smaller cemeteries have been 
virtually confiscated and as land be- 
comes more and more valuable the 
tendency to grab the smaller burial 
places will increase. Many of the 
older cemeteries like Trinity and St. 
Paul’s on Broadway are worth mil- 
lions of dollars and offer a great 
temptation to the managers of the 
Trinity Corporation and others to 
convert them into money. 
It is a large question as to how 
nance for the condemnation were 
valid, and that the city has the right 
to condemn the property. The de- 
cision says: “We think the village 
of Miamisburg has the power to ap- 
propriate the cemetery in question 
for public purposes. It has not been 
in ‘use’ for forty years. The right 
of eminent domain is sovereign, and 
all private and corporate realty is 
subject to it, except that where the 
right has already been exercised, and 
the property continues in the use for 
which it was conveyed or appropri- 
ated, it cannot again be taken for a 
different or inconsistent purpose. 
(Cemetery of Spring Grove vs. Cin. 
Ry. T. W. L. J., 351.) 
“In this case it appearing that in- 
terments were made on payment of 
a fee, no title to the ground being 
granted to individuals, the only rights 
acquired by the survivors were to 
have the bodies of their dead remain 
long enough for thorough decomposi- 
tion, and removed to another burying 
ground, when the property should be 
used for secular purposes. (Windt vs. 
German Reformed Church, 4 Sand. 
Chan. Rep., 503.)” 
The town council of Forty-Fort, 
Pa., passed an ordinance forbidding 
the establishment of a cemetery within 
a thousand feet of any residence in 
the town. The council had heard that 
a cemetery was to be established on 
the main street and took this method 
of preventing it. 
far churches or other corporations 
should go in keeping valuable land 
for building purposes in the form of 
an unsightly burial place or aban- 
doned cemetery for purely sentiment- 
al reasons. It is a common saying 
that the world is for the living rather 
than the dead, yet that sort of senti- 
ment which would bargain consecrat- 
ed ground for dollars in altogether 
too common. There is a golden mean 
between the two extremes in the mat- 
ter of tearing up the old burial place. 
The lesson, however, is not to use as 
burial ground land too near growing 
cities; most people would prefer a 
burial plot far enough away from the 
city to prevent its being cut up into 
building lots, at least within their 
life-time, and the tendency seems 
to be to locate the newer and larger 
cemeteries at least twenty miles from 
the centers of cities like New York 
and Chicago. 
ABANDONING OLD CEMETERIES 
