CITES BY TOPIC:  inhabitant

Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, p. 782

Inhabitant.  One who reside actually and permanently in a given place, and has his domicile there.  Ex parte Shaw, 145 U.S. 444, 12 S.Ct. 935, 36 L.Ed. 786.

The words "inhabitant," "citizen," and "resident," as employed in different constitutions to define the qualifications of electors, means substantially the same thing; and, in general, one is an inhabitant, resident, or citizen at the place where he has his domicile or home.  But the terms "resident" and "inhabitant" have also been held not synonymous, the latter implying a more fixed and permanent abode than the former, and importing privileges and duties to which a mere resident would not be subject.  A corporation can be an inhabitant only in the state of its incorporation.  Sperry Products v. Association of American Railroads, C.C.A.N.Y., 132 F.2d 408, 411.  See also Domicile; Residence.

[Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, p. 782]


Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1856)

It has been suggested that, in adopting it into the Constitution, the words "free inhabitants" were changed for the word "citizens." An examination of the forms of expression commonly used in the State papers of that day, and an attention to the substance of this article of the Confederation, will show that the words "free inhabitants," as then used, were synonymous with citizens. When the Articles of Confederation were adopted, we were in the midst of the war of the Revolution, and there were very few persons then embraced in the words "free inhabitants" who were not born on our soil. It was not a time when many save the [60 U.S. 585] children of the soil were willing to embark their fortunes in our cause, and though there might be an inaccuracy in the uses of words to call free inhabitants citizens, it was then a technical, rather than a substantial, difference. If we look into the Constitutions and State papers of that period, we find the inhabitants or people of these colonies, or the inhabitants of this State or Commonwealth, employed to designate those whom we should now denominate citizens. The substance and purpose of the article prove it was in this sense it used these words; it secures to the free inhabitants of each State the privileges and immunities of free citizens in every State. It is not conceivable that the States should have agreed to extend the privileges of citizenship to persons not entitled to enjoy the privileges of citizens in the States where they dwelt that, under this article, there was a class of persons in some of the States, not citizens, to whom were secured all the privileges and immunities of citizens when they went into other States; and the just conclusion is that, though the Constitution cured an inaccuracy of language, it left the substance of this article in the National Constitution the same as it was in the Articles of Confederation.

[Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1856)]