Wolford v. Lopez · ¶102
Yet the 18th-century laws were targeted in “how” they combated the dangers of poaching: They imposed a default rule rather than a flat prohibition, and they generally confined it to places where poaching was likely to occur. For example, Pennsylvania’s 1721 law and New Jersey’s 1722 law each applied only to “improved or inclosed lands of any plantation.” 1721 Pa. Laws ch. 246, §3, at 255; see 1722 N. J. Laws ch. 35, §4, in Acts of the General Assembly of the Province of New-Jersey 101 (S. Nevill ed. 1752) (“improved or inclosed Lands in any Plantation”). In other words, they covered fenced or developed areas of a “cultivated estate” or “farm.” 2 N. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828) (defining “plantation”); see Brady 173 (“‘Enclosure’ and ‘improvement’ were visible ways a party could claim possession”); see also, e.g., 1763 N. Y. Laws ch. 1233, §1, at 442…Read in context ›
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