NH is not the first state to grapple with how to handle student voters from out-of-state. Those who want to enhance their non-resident votes by taking advantage of our election in a swing state have powerful friends in office, in the courts, and media who don’t mind helping one political party over another. The only way to combat them is to educate NH citizens. I am offering this Massachusetts brief of an 1843 case about domicile. It is not a hard read. It asks some great questions regarding how to determine domicile and the decision of the court seem fair.
Student voters: Massachusetts State Supreme Court – 1843
The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, in an advisory opinion requested by its House of Representatives in 1843, listed certain criteria for determining a student’s domicile which are equally pertinent today:
If the student is maintained and supported by a parent with whom he has been accustomed to reside and to whose home he returns to spend his vacations; “if he describes himself of such place and otherwise manifests his intent to continue his domicile there,” these are circumstances tending to prove his domicile has not changed. If he has no parents or has separated from them and is not supported by them; “if he has a family of his own and removes with them to such town; or by purchase or lease takes up a permanent abode there, without intending to return to his former domicile; if he depend on his own property, income or industry for his support; these are circumstances, more or less conclusive, to show a change of domicile and the acquisition of a domicile in the town where the college is situated.” Opinion of the Justices, supra at 589-90.
In addition to the foregoing considerations,
an editorial note in 8 Ore.L.Rev. 171 (1929) suggests that a registrar might, in substance, ask the student applicant for voter registration the following questions: Did you leave your father’s home for the temporary purpose of attending school or “of cutting loose from home ties”? Do you keep your permanent possessions in the place you claim as your residence, or do you keep there only enough for temporary needs? If you were to fail at the university or were forced to discontinue your studies because of illness would you return to your parents’ home? Would you be living in the university town if the school were not there? If tomorrow you were to transfer to a school in another town would you still consider your present residence your home? For what purposes other than attending school are you in this college town? What occupation do you plan to follow upon graduation and where do you plan to follow it? Where do you maintain church or lodge affiliations, if any? Banking and business connections?
The answer to none of the foregoing questions would be conclusive of domicile, but each would be a circumstance from which the registrar and judge might draw an inference. On the other hand, as the editorial note points out, these circumstances might be outweighed by others; Even though the student left home for temporary purposes only, the evidence might show that he had since “cut loose entirely”; that his possessions were left at his father’s house for storage purposes only; that even though he went to his father’s house for vacations, he went only to visit; that even though he would not have come to the university town but for the university he had made it his actual home independently of that fact. “He might get all his financial support from his father and yet have a home separate from his. He might transact business and belong to organizations in a town other than that of his residence, and so on.” Id. at 173.
The author suggested that before attempting to register as a voter in the town where he is attending school a student should ask himself whether he, in good faith, considers the college town his home. “Each student is in a position to make an honest and accurate decision for himself. Other people can judge only from outward facts and circumstances although in case of a judicial determination that judgment would have to prevail.” Id. at 173.
In this case, plaintiff left her parents’ home in Tarboro to enter Meredith College at Raleigh as a freshman student. The college sends her grades to her parents. Her father pays her college expenses, supports and maintains her entirely. During *59 vacations, and when the school is closed, she returns to her parents’ home. Her only dwelling place in Raleigh is the dormitory room which she occupies subject to the rules and regulations of the college. Her personal property, except that required for her immediate needs, remains at her parents’ home. Her church membership is in Tarboro. Her post-graduation plans are indefinite although she is “thinking about law school.” Pending her appeal to the Superior Court from the refusal of the Wake County Board of Elections to register her, upon the advice of counsel, plaintiff moved her checking account from a bank in Tarboro to one in Raleigh. She also changed the address on her driver’s license and on her college registration to show Meredith College as her permanent address.
Certainly the foregoing evidence would have fully justified the judge below in finding that plaintiff was temporarily sojourning in Raleigh for the purpose of attending college; that she had not abandoned her domicile in Tarboro; and that she was, therefore, not eligible to vote in Raleigh. However, he did not make such findings. Instead he found that plaintiff had abandoned her former domicile and acquired a new one in Raleigh. The facts he found are binding on this Court, and they support his judgment that she is entitled to vote in Wake County. We must, therefore, affirm his judgment. However, as previously pointed out, whether a particular student is entitled to register and vote in the town where he or she is attending college must be determined by the application of the rules stated herein to the specific facts of that individual’s case. Decision here relates directly to plaintiff only. This is in no sense a class action.
It also seems appropriate to note that had Judge Brewer found that plaintiff’s domicile remained in Tarboro she would not have been disfranchised. She would merely have found herself in the same situation as many of the State’s judges, teachers, traveling salesmen, construction workers, truck drivers, executives, and a host of others whose work will take them away from home on election day and who will not be able to vote unless they make timely application for an absentee ballot. The election law, however, has amply safeguarded the voting privileges of all its citizens, and there is no legal or practical reason why any qualified voter cannot vote at the place of his legal residence if he is sufficiently interested in doing so. G.S. §§ 163-226 to 163-240.5.
Affirmed.
