Can a small-town mayor still meet a town residency requirement if his spouse lives in a different town?

Plain-English summary

The Mayor of Berlin, Maryland, who had served in that office for 22 years, asked the Attorney General whether he still met the town charter's requirement that the Mayor be a legal resident of Berlin. The question arose because, since his second marriage in 1964, his wife had continued living in a house she owned in Salisbury, Wicomico County, while he kept an apartment in Berlin. The opinion applied Maryland case law on domicile, chiefly Bainum v. Kalen, which treats "residence" in a public-office qualification as meaning legal domicile (the place a person intends as their true, fixed home) rather than simply wherever a person spends the most time. Working through a list of some twenty factors courts use to determine domicile, including voter registration, tax filings, business location, banking, driver's license address, and where a person's children attended school, the opinion found that nearly all of them pointed to Berlin: the Mayor had voted only in Berlin for over 45 years, paid local taxes there, ran his business there, banked there, and was widely known there as a longtime businessman and Mayor. It concluded that his continued residence with his wife in Salisbury did not show an intent to abandon his Berlin domicile, so he remained a legal resident of Berlin under the charter, though the opinion stressed this conclusion depended on the specific facts of his case.

Currency note

This opinion was issued in 1984. Subsequent statutory amendments, court decisions, or later AG opinions may have changed the analysis. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, deadline, or remedy mentioned here.

Common questions

Can a small-town mayor still meet a town residency requirement if his spouse lives in a different town?
According to this 1984 opinion, yes, at least on the facts presented. The Attorney General concluded that the Mayor of Berlin remained a legal resident of the town even though his wife lived in her own house in Salisbury, because the great majority of factors courts use to determine domicile (voting history, tax address, business location, banking, and more) all pointed to Berlin as his true domicile.

Does living with your spouse in another town automatically mean you live there too, for legal purposes?
No, according to the opinion. It explained that Maryland courts presume a married man's domicile is where his wife and family live, but that presumption is rebuttable, and a person can have several places they stay while maintaining only one legal domicile.

What kind of evidence did the opinion look at to decide someone's true residence?
The opinion applied a roughly twenty-factor test drawn from Bainum v. Kalen and a prior AG opinion, covering things like voter registration, tax returns, business location, bank accounts, driver's license address, mailing address, club memberships, where children attend school, and how the person is generally known in the community.

Background and statutory framework

Section C4-2 of the Berlin Town Charter required that a candidate for Mayor have resided in the town for at least one year before election, which the opinion read as also implicitly requiring the Mayor to maintain town residence throughout the term. The opinion measured the Mayor's situation against Bainum v. Kalen, 272 Md. 490 (1974), the leading Maryland case construing "residence" in a public-office context as meaning domicile, and against Hill v. Board of Registry, 171 Md. 653 (1936), a case the opinion described as having a strikingly similar fact pattern, a man registered to vote near his business rather than at the home where his wife and family lived, which the Court of Appeals had upheld as a valid domicile.

Citations

Statutes:

• §C4-2 of the Town Charter (Berlin, Maryland) (one-year residency requirement for Mayor)
• §C6-1 of the Town Charter (Berlin, Maryland) (later voting qualification permitting property owners to vote without residing in town)
• §32 of the Code of Public Local Laws of Worcester County (1961 ed.) (Mayor must reside in and be a qualified voter of the town)
• §38 of the Code of Public Local Laws of Worcester County (1961 ed.) (residency requirement for town voters, later amended)
• Article I, §1 of the Maryland Constitution (county/district voter registration requires domicile)
• Article 33, §3-4(b)(4) of the Maryland Code (same)
• Article 33, §3-6 of the Maryland Code (voter registration oath as to residence)
• §13-408 of the Transportation Article (vehicle registration must list owner's address)
• §16-106 of the Transportation Article (driver's license applicant must certify residence address)

Cases:

• Bainum v. Kalen, 272 Md. 490 (1974) (leading case defining "residence" for public office as domicile, and listing factors relevant to determining domicile)
• Dart v. Skolnik, 280 Md. 101, 115 (1977) (change of residence vacates an office requiring residency, absent contrary legislative intent)
• Comptroller of the Treasury v. Haskin, 298 Md. 681 (1984) (domicile depends on intent shown by a multitude of factors; no single factor is conclusive)
• Howard v. Skinner, 87 Md. 556, 559 (1898) (residence for political/voting purposes means a place of fixed present domicile)
• Shenton v. Abbott, 178 Md. 526, 530 (1940) (a person may have several places of abode but only one domicile)
• Harrison v. Harrison, 117 Md. 607, 614 (1912) (domicile intent shown more by conduct than by statements)
• Wagner v. Scurlock, 166 Md. 284, 292 (1934) (same; also on what is required to establish a new domicile)
• Gallagher v. Bd. of Elections, 219 Md. 192, 206 (1959) (disapproving language from Schaeffer v. Gilbert suggesting "reside" means mere physical presence rather than domicile)
• Rasin v. Leaverton, 181 Md. 91, 94 (1942) (a voter registration oath as to residence is not a meaningless formality)
• Hill v. Board of Registry, 171 Md. 653 (1936) (upholding a voter's registration near his business despite his wife and family living elsewhere)
• Schaeffer v. Gilbert, 73 Md. 66 (1890) (earlier definition of residence, later partly disapproved)
• Drueding v. Devlin, 234 F.Supp. 721, 724 (D. Md. 1964), aff'd, 380 U.S. 125 (1965) (citing Hill with approval)

Source

• Landing page: https://oag.maryland.gov/resources-info/Pages/attorney-general%E2%80%99s-opinions.aspx
• Original PDF: https://oag.maryland.gov/resources-info/Documents/pdfs/Opinions/1984/Volume69_1984.pdf

Original opinion text

Best-effort transcription from a scanned PDF. Minor errors may remain, the linked PDF is authoritative.

PUBLIC OFFICERS

Residency Requirements-Local Government-Municipalities-Mayor-Under Facts Of Particular Case, Mayor Meets Town Residency Requirement Even Though Spouse Resides Outside Of Town.

March 26, 1984

The Honorable John Howard Burbage
Mayor of Berlin

You have requested our opinion on whether you are a legal resident of the Town of Berlin within the meaning of §C4-2 of the Town Charter.

Section C4-2 of the Town Charter expressly requires that a candidate of the office of Mayor "have resided in the town for at least one . . . year immediately preceding his election"; implicitly, this also requires that the Mayor maintain a residence in the town throughout his or her tenure.1 Although you have been the Mayor of Berlin for some 22 years, and you consider yourself to have been a lifelong resident of Berlin since the age of 7, questions periodically have been raised by others as to whether you in fact meet the Charter's residency requirement.

At the outset, we should emphasize that questions like this are not normally the kind that can be answered definitively in an advisory opinion. Rather, as the courts have indicated, determinations of residency require an intensive and complete scrutiny of all of the facts and circumstances of a given case.2 Moreover, some of the facts and circumstances of your case are somewhat atypical, necessarily preventing us from predicting with complete certainty how a court ultimately might rule. Nevertheless, because of the unusual nature of your situation, we will try to advise you of our views on the matter.

As explained more fully below, based on the relevant facts and circumstances known to us, we believe that you are a resident of the Town of Berlin. Put another way, if your residency qualifications were challenged in court, we believe that you would likely prevail.

I
Factual Overview

The basic factual background, as you have explained it to us, can be summarized as follows:3

You were born in Snow Hill, Maryland in 1916. In 1923, when you were 7 years old, your family moved to the Town of Berlin, Worcester County, Maryland. You grew up and went to school in Berlin.

In 1935, you married your first wife in Berlin. Your son and daughter were born in Berlin. From 1935 until 1959, when your first wife died, you lived with your wife and children in a house located in Berlin. After your wife's death, you continued to live in that house with your children. Until their high school graduation, your children attended school exclusively in Berlin.

In 1962, you were first elected Mayor of Berlin. You have continuously served in that capacity to date, for some 22 years. At the time you were first elected Mayor, the Town Charter required, as it still does, that the Mayor both "have resided in the town" and "be a qualified voter of the town". See §32 of the Code of Public Local Laws of Worcester County (1961 ed.). And, at that time, a "qualified voter of the town" was required, among other things, to "ha[ve] resided within the corporate limits of the town for six months next preceding any town election". See §38 of the Code of Public Local Laws of Worcester County (1961 ed.).4

In 1964, you married your present wife, who owned a home in Salisbury, Wicomico County, Maryland. Although your present wife decided to continue living in Salisbury, you nevertheless retained your house in Berlin, where you maintained a residence for yourself and for your two children, who continued to attend school in Berlin.

A few years later, after your children were graduated from high school and had begun to attend college away from home, you sold this house and moved your Berlin living quarters to a furnished apartment located at 11 Williams Street/7 North Main Street, Berlin, Maryland.5

Although you do, of course, spend time with your wife in Salisbury, you nevertheless have continuously maintained your apartment in Berlin as your intended legal residence. You use this apartment regularly, albeit not exclusively, for living, eating, and sleeping, and it is fully furnished for those purposes. The house in Salisbury where your wife resides is titled in her name alone; you have no legal or equitable interest in that property.6

The issue, in sum, is whether your true, legal residence is in Berlin or Salisbury.7

II
Legal Overview

The most instructive case involving issues of residence, and the factors to be considered in resolving those issues, is Bainum v. Kalen, 272 Md. 490 (1974). In this Part, we will review the applicable definitions, presumptions, and factors to be considered, as identified in that case.

A. Residence as Domicile

As indicated in Bainum, the term "residence", when used in the context of a qualification for public office, means "domicile":

"[T]his Court has consistently held that the words 'reside' or 'resident' in a constitutional provision or statute delineating rights, duties, obligations, privileges, etc., would be construed to mean 'domicile' unless a contrary intent be shown. Thus, our predecessors stated in Howard v. Skinner, [87 Md. 556, 559 (1898)]: 'Residence, as contemplated by the framers of our Constitution, for political or voting purposes, means a place of fixed present domicile.'" Bainum, 272 Md. at 496 (emphasis in original).

Thus:

"A person may have several places of abode or dwelling but '[h]e can have only one domicile at a time.' Shenton v. Abbott, [178 Md. 526, 530 (1940)]. A person's domicile has been defined as the place 'with which he has a settled connection for legal purposes' and the 'place where a man has his true, fixed, permanent home, habitation and principal establishment, without any present intention of removing therefrom, and to which place he has, whenever he is absent, the intention of returning.' Shenton v. Abbott, supra, 178 Md. at 530." Bainum, 272 Md. at 497.

B. Presumptions

The "controlling factor" in determining a person's domicile is his or her intent. Comptroller of the Treasury v. Haskin, 298 Md. 681, 691 (1984). Thus, as the Court of Appeals explained in Bainum:

"One's domicile, generally, is that place where he intends it to be. Harrison v. Harrison, [117 Md. 607, 614 (1912)]; Wagner v. Scurlock, [166 Md. 284, 292 (1934)]; Gallagher v. Bd. of Elections, [219 Md. 192, 198 (1959)]. However, the determination of intent is not dependent upon what one says at a particular time. As this Court has stated, intent regarding domicile 'may be more satisfactorily shown by what is done than by what is said.' Wagner v. Scurlock, supra, 166 Md. at 292; Harrison v. Harrison, supra, 117 Md. at 614." Bainum, 272 Md. at 497.

There are certain "well established principles", or presumptions, used in determining a person's intent with regard to his or her domicile:

First, there is the presumption that "once a place of domicile is determined or established, a person retains his domicile there unless the evidence affirmatively shows an abandonment of that domicile." Bainum, 272 Md. at 498. See also Comptroller v. Haskin, 298 Md. at 690-91.

Second, "'[t]he presumption of the law is that where a person actually lives is his domicile, though this is a rebuttable presumption.'" Bainum, 272 Md. at 498 (quoting Harrison v. Harrison, 117 Md. at 615).

Finally, the "'highest evidence of domicile'" is where a person votes. Bainum, 272 Md. at 498 (quoting Wagner v. Scurlock, 166 Md. at 292).

In cases where these presumptions coincide in pointing to but one jurisdiction, the inquiry usually is at an end. Where, however, these factors do not coincide or are themselves less than clear, or where, as, perhaps, is the case here, "there are special circumstances explaining a particular place of abode", the court will "look to and weigh a myriad of other factors in deciding a person's domicile". Bainum, 272 Md. at 498-99.

C. Additional Factors

In Bainum, 272 Md. at 499, the Court of Appeals listed a number of the specific factors that, in addition to "any other facts revealing contact with one or the other jurisdiction", a court would look to. And, in 56 Opinions of the Attorney General 189, 197-98 (1971), this Office also listed a number of factors that have been considered by the courts for this purpose. The following is a synthesis of those two lists:

1. Where the person is or has been registered to vote.

2. Whether the person has ever claimed any other place of residence for any reason.

3. Whether the person has taken an oath as to his or her residence.

4. Where the person pays taxes and the address given as his or her residence on tax returns.

5. Where the person is employed.

6. Where the person owns property.

7. Where the person's automobile is registered.

8. What address is given on the person's driver's license.

9. What address is given on other licenses or governmental documents.

10. Where the person banks.

11. Where the person keeps charge accounts.

12. What address is given in contracts or documents.

13. The address at which the person receives mail.

14. Where furniture and other personal belongings are kept.

15. Which professional, fraternal, religious, or social organizations does the person belong to.

16. Where the person's children attend school.

17. Where the person's spouse and family reside.

18. Where the person's regular physicians and dentists are located.

19. How often the person returns to his or her purported place of residence.

20. In and to which community is the person best known.8

In applying these factors to any particular case, there is no requirement that the answers to all or any particular number of them uniformly point to a particular result. Rather, "[i]n the final analysis, the question of residency is a matter of judgment", based on the balanced application of these factors to the particular case. 56 Opinions of the Attorney General at 198. See also Comptroller v. Haskin, 298 Md. at 691 ("No single circumstance has ever been deemed conclusive.").

III
Consideration of Specific Factors

Applying the information that you have provided us to the various factors listed in Part II C above, we find that, on balance, a Berlin domicile is suggested. We will review each of the factors in the order listed above.

1. Where the person is or has been registered to vote.

As previously indicated, the "highest evidence of domicile" is where one votes. It is particularly significant, therefore, that for all of your adult life, for over 45 years, you have been registered in Berlin for purposes of voting in all town, county, state, and federal elections. That is, as you have advised us, you have never registered to vote as a resident of any locality other than Berlin; and you have never voted in any county, state, or federal election other than in, and as a resident of, Berlin.9 To be sure, since 1964, residency in Berlin has not been a necessary prerequisite to voting in town elections; property ownership is enough.10 Nevertheless, for purposes of county, state, and federal elections, property ownership is irrelevant; for those elections, one may only register to vote in the particular county and election district where one is domiciled.11 In your case, you are registered as being domiciled in Berlin, specifically, in District 3, Precinct 1/Legislative District 38/Congressional District 1, where your apartment is located.12

2. Whether the person has ever claimed any other place of residence for any reason.

Since the age of 7, you have never claimed any place but Berlin as being your place of residence.

3. Whether the person has taken an oath as to his or her residence.

In registering to vote, you took an oath that your residence was in Berlin. See Article 33, §3-6 of the Maryland Code. Such an oath "is not a meaningless form". Rasin v. Leaverton, 181 Md. 91, 94 (1942).

4. Where the person pays taxes and the address given as his or her residence on tax forms.

Your state and federal tax returns all give your Berlin apartment as your place of residence, and you pay local income tax as a resident of Berlin, Worcester County.

5. Where the person is employed.

Although you have several business interests, your primary business for over three decades has involved the ownership and operation of a chain of department stores, "Style Guide", which has its principal office in Berlin. You also serve as a director of Calvin B. Taylor Bank in Berlin. You do not have any business office in Salisbury.

6. Where the person owns property.

You own property in Berlin, although you also own property in Salisbury, Ocean City, and elsewhere.13

7. Where the person's automobile is registered.

The registration card for a motor vehicle is required to contain "[t]he name and address of the owner". §13-408 of the Transportation Article. In your case, however, you do not have an automobile registered in your name.

8. What address is given on the person's driver's license.

An applicant for a driver's license must "certify" his or her "residence address". §16-106 of the Transportation Article. In your case, that residence address is 11 Williams Street/7 North Main Street, Berlin.

9. What address is given on other licenses or governmental documents.

On your pilot's license, as well as all other licenses and governmental documents, your Berlin address is given as your residence.

10. Where the person banks.

You bank in Berlin. You do not maintain any bank accounts in Salisbury.

11. Where the person keeps charge accounts.

All of your credit cards (American Express, Master Charge, Telephone Charge Card, Hilton Hotel, etc.) are issued to you at your Berlin address.

12. What address is given in contracts or documents.

All of your other business and personal contracts and documents give your Berlin address as your residence.

13. The address at which the person receives mail.

Your mailing address is 11 Williams Street/7 North Main Street, Berlin, Maryland 21811.

14. Where furniture and other personal belongings are kept.

You keep personal belongings both in Berlin and in Salisbury.

15. Which professional, fraternal, religious, or social organizations does the person belong to.

You belong to several such organizations in Berlin, e.g., Lions Club, Masonic Lodge, and Chamber of Commerce. The library to which you belong is in Berlin. You belong to churches in Berlin, Salisbury, and Ocean City. You are not a member of any professional, fraternal, or social organization in Salisbury.

16. Where the person's children attend school.

Before attending college, both of your children attended school exclusively in Berlin. Indeed, they did so even after your marriage to your present wife; and, even while your new wife lived in Salisbury, your children continued to reside and go to school in Berlin.

17. Where the person's spouse and family reside.

It is ordinarily presumed that the domicile of a married man is at the place where his wife and family reside. Hill v. Board of Registry, 171 Md. 653, 656 (1936). That presumption, however, is rebuttable. Id. In this regard, we note that, even after your second marriage and while your wife resided in Salisbury, your children continued to reside and attend school in Berlin. This factor, in addition to the several others discussed here, might well serve to rebut this presumption. See also Part IV C below.

18. Where the person's regular physicians and dentists are located.

Your regular physician and dentist are located in Berlin.

19. How often the person returns to his or her purported place of residence.

Obviously, you do spend as much time as possible with your wife in Salisbury. Nevertheless, you regularly return to and frequent your Berlin apartment.14

20. In and to which community is the person best known.

We do not know, and thus cannot evaluate, the full extent of your reputation in Salisbury. It is clear, however, that you are generally known, both in Berlin and in Salisbury, as a long-time Berlin businessman and, for some 22 years, Mayor of Berlin. Indeed, given the charter requirement that the Mayor of Berlin be a resident of the town, if follows that the people of Berlin, who have repeatedly elected you as their Mayor, know and consider you to be a part of, and a resident in, their community.

IV
Analysis

A. Introduction

From our review of the facts reported to us, as set forth in Parts I and III above, it seems evident that your intent is, and always has been, to consider Berlin as your place of residence/domicile. It seems equally evident that, at least until 1964, when you married your present wife, and after you were first elected to be Mayor of Berlin, your place of domicile unquestionably was in Berlin.

The issue, then, is whether "the evidence affirmatively shows an abandonment of that domicile". Bainum, 272 Md. at 498. That is, after your marriage in 1964, did you take up a new place of abode in Salisbury and, if so, did you do so with the intent of abandoning your domicile in Berlin? We think not.

B. Discussion

As indicated above, a person may have "several places of abode or dwelling", but "only one domicile". Bainum, 272 Md. at 497. And, as the Court of Appeals has repeatedly indicated:

"'When one takes up a new residence, in order to avail himself of the rights which such change of domicile confers, it must not be so much with the intention of there remaining, but [with the intention] of the abandonment of his former domicile as a place of residence, and "excludes any definite intention to return to the place of the previous domicile."'" Bainum, 272 Md. at 498 (quoting Wagner v. Scurlock, 166 Md. at 292-93).

In your case, even if you were considered to have taken up a new or additional place of abode or dwelling with your wife in Salisbury, there appears to be no indication that you did so "to avail [yourself] of [any] rights which [a] change of domicile confers". Simply put, you do not appear to have ever benefited from any legal right or privilege that might attend a domicile in Salisbury, or in any other place than Berlin.15

Even if you were said to "actually live" in Salisbury, the presumption of law that equates this to domicile "is a rebuttable presumption", particularly "where there are special circumstances explaining a particular place of abode". Bainum, 272 Md at 498-99. In our view, the several factors outlined in Part III above, might well serve to rebut such a presumption.16

Again, the "highest evidence of domicile" is the place where one votes. Bainum, 272 Md. at 498. In your case, that place is, and always has been, Berlin. Moreover, we do not believe that a court would lightly overlook the fact that, for some 22 years, you have in fact served as the Mayor of the Town of Berlin, elected to that position under a charter that requires the Mayor to be a town resident.

Finally, from the many other facts and circumstances reported to us, as outlined above, it appears that your contacts with Berlin are far more extensive than are your contacts with Salisbury.

C. The Hill Case

We have found one reported case in Maryland with a fact pattern that is remarkably similar to yours. And that case strongly suggests that your claim to a domicile in Berlin is a legitimate one.

In Hill v. Board of Registry, 171 Md. 653 (1936), the Court was asked to resolve a dispute involving the residence of John P. Schultheis. Schultheis, professing to reside at 635 West Fayette Street, was registered to vote in the then Ninth Precinct of the Fourth Ward of Baltimore City. Schultheis's wife and family, however, resided at 140 North East Avenue in the then Twentieth Precinct of the Sixth Ward.

The Court summarized the relevant facts of that case as follows:

"Schultheis is and for many years has been a saloon keeper. He formerly conducted a saloon at 22 Pearl Street, which is also in the Ninth Precinct of the Fourth Ward, in which he has been a registered voter for fourteen or fifteen years. Some three years ago he left the Pearl Street place and opened a saloon and restaurant at 635 West Fayette Street [in the same precinct and ward]

Notwithstanding the fact that he maintained a home for his wife and family on North East Avenue, Schultheis claims that he himself resided first at the Pearl Street saloon when he was in business there, and later at the Fayette Street place when he removed from Pearl Street. He had a room over the Fayette Street saloon, kept his clothes either there or at a tailor's place 'across the street,' he slept there, he was 'there more than anywhere else,' and although he spent a couple of evenings a week with his family, he regarded it as his home. He did that, he said, because the nature of his business kept him up late at night, and 'rather than go home' he would 'stay up there.' He had been registered from that precinct for many years, and the precinct itself is in the same legislative and congressional district and councilmanic ward as the home of his wife and family." 171 Md. at 655.

Given those facts, the Court of Appeals concluded:

"Upon these facts it cannot be said as a matter of law that Schultheis was illegally registered as a voter in the Ninth Precinct of the Fourth Ward of Baltimore City. Apart from the fact that his wife and family reside in another precinct there could not well be any doubt of the soundness of that conclusion. But while it is presumed ordinarily that the domicile of a married man is at the place where his wife and family reside (19 C. J. 433), that presumption is rebuttable (Ibid.), for there is no principle of law which prevents a husband from having a legal residence apart from his wife and family." 171 Md. at 656.

The facts in Hill are obviously quite similar to yours. The precedential value of this decision, however, is somewhat uncertain. In Hill, the Court quoted from, and seemingly relied in part on, a definition of "residence" found in the earlier case of Schaeffer v. Gilbert, 73 Md. 66 (1890). As later explained in Bainum, "[s]ome language in the opinion in Schaeffer..., arguably supports" the proposition that the term "reside", as used in statutory qualifications for political office or voting, "means actual physical presence or abode rather than domicile"; and, "to the extent that it does, the language from the Schaeffer case [has since been] specifically disapproved" by the Court of Appeals in Gallagher v. Board of Elections, 219 Md. 192, 206 (1959). Bainum, 272 Md. at 496.

Nevertheless, the ruling in Hill has never been disapproved. And the other principles of law on which Hill relied, e.g., that a wife who lives apart from her husband can have a separate domicile of choice, are still valid today.17 Finally, although there conceivably could have been other facts and circumstances present in Hill that were not described by the Court in its opinion, it nevertheless appears that there are considerably more factors in your case to support your claim of residence in Berlin than were described by the Court of Appeals as being sufficient to support the quite similar claim of residence in Hill.

V
Conclusion

In the final analysis, based on our understanding of the relevant facts and circumstances of your case, as described to us, and necessarily subject to the caveat that there might be other facts and circumstances that we do not know about, it is our opinion that you are a legal resident of the Town of Berlin within the meaning of §C4-2 of the Town Charter. Hence, although the rather unusual nature of your situation prevents us from predicting with complete certainty how a court ultimately might rule on this question, we nevertheless believe that, if your residency qualifications were challenged in court, you would likely prevail.

Stephen H. Sachs, Attorney General

Avery Aisenstark,
Chief Counsel,
Opinions and Advice

1 See Dart v. Skolnik, 280 Md. 101, 115 (1977): "[W]hen residence is a prerequisite to a given office[,] then a change of residence vacates that office, absent a legislative expression to the contrary."

2 See, e.g., Comptroller of the Treasury v. Haskin, 298 Md. 681, 691 (1984) ("Domicile by its very nature depends upon ... a multitude of factors associated with th[e] particular individual.") Normally, those factors can best be developed only through an adversarial proceeding, such as in a court of law. Absent such a proceeding, one can never be sure of knowing all of the relevant facts and circumstances of a particular case.

3 In Part III below, we will review these and several other, more specific facts and circumstances relevant to this inquiry. The following introductory overview, however, might be helpful to place the issue in proper perspective.

4 In 1964, §38 was amended to delete town residency as a requirement for voting in town elections, while retaining a requirement that a voter own property in the town with an assessed value of at least $100. See §38 of the Public Local Laws of Worcester County (1961 ed., 1965 supp.). As even later amended, the Town Charter now permits voting in town elections by anyone who either resides in the town or owns property in the town with an assessed value of at least $200. See §C6-1 of the Town Charter.

5 This apartment is in the same building as is your business office. The building is located at the corner of Main and Williams Streets, hence the alternative street addresses.

6 You acknowledge that, on an average, you might spend more nonbusiness hours in Salisbury than in Berlin. Nevertheless, you have indicated that this is solely as an accommodation to your wife, who does not wish to reside in Berlin, and that it does not at all reflect any intent on your part to abandon your previously established residence in Berlin and acquire a new residence in Salisbury. See notes 15 and 16 below and accompanying text.

7 You also own vacation homes in Ocean City, Maryland, and in Florida. However, there appears to be no factual basis for considering either of these places as your legal residence, nor, apparently, has anyone contended otherwise.

8 Even this combined list is not exhaustive of the many possible factors that might be considered by a court as "revealing contact with one or the other jurisdiction". See note 2 above and accompanying text.

9 You have voted in Ocean City and Salisbury town elections, but you have done so solely in your capacity as a local property owner, never as a purported resident of either town.

10 See note 4 above.

11 See Article I, §1 of the Maryland Constitution; Article 33, §3-4(b)(4) of the Maryland Code.

12 We understand that, sometime in the early 1970s, a dispute arose over your residence in Berlin and your consequent ability to vote in Worcester County elections. (Salisbury, of course, is in Wicomico County.) A hearing on the matter was held by the county board of supervisors of elections, which ultimately concluded that your residence in Berlin was legitimate, entitling you to register and vote as a county resident.

13 You have told us that the property you own in Salisbury is investment property. And, as already indicated above, you have no financial interest in the house that your wife owns and lives in.

14 See note 6 above.

15 Indeed, as you have explained it, the sole reason for your "presence" in Salisbury is the fact that your wife wanted to continue living in the house that she had inherited prior to her marriage to you. See note 6 above.

16 See also note 15 above.

17 Compare, e.g., Restatement of Conflict of Laws §28 (1934) (quoted in Hill, 171 Md. at 656-57) with Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws §21 (1971).

Moreover, the particular part of the Schaeffer definition of "residence" that the Court in Hill especially emphasized, that "one's voting residence is 'one's actual home, in the sense of having no other home'", Hill, 171 Md. at 658, is not unlike the currently accepted definition of "domicile", the "place where a man has his true, fixed, permanent home, ... without any present intention of removing therefrom", Bainum, 272 Md. at 497.

We also note that, even since Gallagher, the Hill case has been cited with approval by both this office and the federal courts. See Drueding v. Devlin, 234 F.Supp. 721, 724 (D. Md. 1964), aff'd, 380 U.S. 125 (1965) (per curiam); 56 Opinions of the Attorney General 189, 194 (1971).