Blacks Law Dict. 1st ed

141

BOARD OF HEALTH

BLIND

forming one aggregate, this is called a "blended fund." BLIND. One who is deprived of the sense or faculty of sight. BLINKS. In old English law. Boughs broken down from trees and thrown in a way where deer are likely to pass. Jacob. BLOCKADE. In international law. A marine investment or beleaguering of a town or harbor. A sort of circumvallation round a place by which all foreign connection and correspondence is, as far as human power can effect it, to be cut off. 1 C. Rob. Adm. 151. It is not necessary, however, that the place should be invested by land, as well as by sea, in order to constitute a legal block ade; and, if a place be blockaded by sea only, it is no violation of belligerent rights for the neutral to carry on commerce with it by in land communications. 1 Kent, Comm. 147. The actual investment of a port or place by a hostile force fully competent, under ordinary cir cumstances, to cut off all communication there with, so arranged or disposed as to be able to ap ply its force to every point of practicable access or approach to the port or place so invested. Bouvier. It is called a "blockade de facto" when the usual notice of the blockade has not been given to the neutral powers by the govern ment causing the investment, in consequence of which the blockading squadron has to warn off all approaching vessels. BLOOD. Kindred; consanguinity; fam ily relationship; relation by descent from a common ancestor. One person is "of the blood" of another when they are related by lineal descent or collateral kinship. Brothers and sisters are said to be of the whole blood if they have the same father and mother, and of the half blood if they have only one parent in common. 5 Whart. 477. BLOOD MONEY. A weregild, or pe cuniary mulct paid by a slayer to the rela tives of his victim. Also used, in a popular sense, as descrip tive of money paid by way of reward for the apprehension and conviction of a person charged with a capital crime. BLOODWIT. An amercement for blood shed. Cowell. The privilege of taking such amercements. Skene. A privilege or exemption from paying a fine or amercement assessed for bloodshed. Cowell.

f BLOODY HAND. In forest law. The I having the hands or other parts bloody, which, in a person caught trespassing in the forest against venison, was one of the four kinds of circumstantial evidence of his hav ing killed deer, although he was not found in the act of chasing or hunting. Manwood. BLUE LAWS. A supposititious code of severe laws for the regulation of religious and personal conduct in the colonies of Con necticut and New Haven; hence any rigid Sunday laws or religious regulations. The assertion by some writers of the existence of the blue laws has no other basis than the adoption, by the first authorities of the New Haven colony, of the Scriptures as their code of law and government, and their strict application of Mosaic principles. Century Diet. BOARD. A committee of persons organ ized under authority of law in order to exer cise certain authorities, have oversight or control of certain matters, or discharge cer tain functions of a magisterial, representa tive, or fiduciary character. Thus, "board of aldermen," "board of health," "board of directors," "board of works." Also lodging, food, entertainment, fur nished to a guest at an inn or boarding house. BOARD OF HEALTH. A board or commission created by the sovereign authority or by municipalities, invested with certain powers and charged with certain duties in relation to the preservation and improvement of the public health. General boards of health are usually charged with general and advisory duties, with the collection of vital statistics, the investigation of sanitary conditions, and the methods of dealing with epidemic and other diseases, the quarantine laws, etc. Such are the national board of health, created by act of congress of March 3, 1879, (20 St. at Large, 484.) and the state boards of health created by the leg islatures of most of the states. Local boards of health are charged with more direct and immediate means of secur ing the public health, and exercise inquisi torial and executive powers in relation to sanitary regulations, offensive nuisances, markets, adulteration of food, slaughter houses, drains and sewers, and similar sub jects. Such boards are constituted in most American cities either by general law, by their charteis, or by municipal ordinance, and in England by the statutes. 11 & 12 Viet.

Archive CD Books USA