land ceded by the States concerned on the condition that Congress or the United States should exercise exclusive control over it forever. Maryland ceded 64 square miles (including water), the whole of Washington County, and Virginia ceded 36 square miles, Alexandria County. In 1846, as no Government buildings had been erected on the Virginia side, Alexandria County was retroceded. Within the present District, probably on the site of Anacostia, stood the famous Indian village of Powhattan, Nacochtank, or Anacostan, which Captain Smith visited in 1608. In 1663 Francis Pope, an Englishman, established a plantation where Washington was afterwards built. To the site of Georgetown settlers came probably as early as 1665, and in 1751 a town was laid out here, which in 1789 was regularly incorporated. Immediately after the close of the Revolution there was much discussion about the location of the permanent seat of government, and, after the adoption of the Constitution in 1789, this question gave rise to the first debate which aroused bitter sectional feeling. Finally, on June 28, 1790, after the claims of New York, Philadelphia, Germantown, Baltimore, and several other places had been fully considered, Congress decided that after 1800 the Federal capital should be moved to “a district or territory not exceeding 10 miles square on the River Potomac between the mouth of the Eastern Branch and Conogocheague.” This decision was reached partly as the result of a compromise and partly in deference to the known wishes of Washington. See Washington.
DISTRINGAS. The name of a writ or process in the nature of an attachment or execution, taken from the emphatic word of the writ directed to the sheriff—viz. “It is hereby commanded that you distrain” the defendant, etc. It was formerly issued in England for a variety of purposes, such as forcing a defendant who neglected to appear to present himself in court, or forcing a corporation to obey a subpoena, or compelling jurors to attend court, or a defendant in an action in detinue after judgment to deliver the goods to the plaintiff. The writ has been abolished in England, as well as in most of the United States, although in Virginia it is retained as a form of execution in cases of detinue. See Execution.
DISTURBANCE. The common-law offense of violating an incorporeal property right, as an easement, a profit, or a public right in the land of another. As such rights do not carry with them the right of possession, but, as the technical expression is, ‘lie in grant,’ and not ‘in livery,’ they cannot usually be protected by the action of trespass, which contemplates an interference with the possession of a corporeal interest in land. But such rights, however impalpable, do really constitute property, and they will be protected by appropriate legal proceedings against a disturbance by the owner of the land or by any other person whatsoever. In a few cases, as where one has an exclusive right to the use of another's land as a sole and several pasturage—such right being nearly equivalent to the right of possession of the premises—the action of trespass is available for its protection. In other cases the disturbance constitutes a nuisance, which may be abated either by the act of the party injured thereby, or by the action known as ‘trespass on the case,’ or, more shortly, ‘case’; or, in a proper case, by an injunction in equity.
The forms of disturbance are various, depending upon the nature of the right involved. Thus a common of pasture may be disturbed by shutting or driving out the cattle of the claimant of the right, or by unlawfully permitting other cattle to crop the herbage. In the last case the claimant may take the cattle damage feasant and impound them. A franchise is disturbed by wrongfully taking the tolls accruing therefrom, or by setting up a competing use, as a bridge, ferry, or turnpike. For interference with an advowson or right of presentation to a benefice, known as disturbance of patronage, a special action was provided, known as writ of right of advowson. Disturbance of ways happens “where a person who hath a right of way over another's ground by grant or prescription is obstructed by inclosures or other obstacles, or by plowing across it, by which means he cannot enjoy his right of way, or at least in so commodious a manner as he might have done” (2 Bla. Com., 242). This is remediable by the act of the party injured, removing the obstacle, or by an action on the case.
All of these forms of disturbance of private rights, together with the remedies appropriate to them, exist to-day, as at common law, without material alteration. The ancient wrong of disturbance of tenure, which consisted in breaking the feudal tie of lord and tenant, has become obsolete with the disappearance of the feudal system of land tenure. The disturbance of public rights, as of a highway or a public right of common or of fishing, may be either a private nuisance, remediable by the individual whose right is interfered with, or a public nuisance, or purpresture, remediable by the State. See Easement; Nuisance; Profit; Trespass, etc.; and consult the authorities referred to under Easement.
DISTURBANCE OF PUBLIC WORSHIP. A modern statutory offense, which has, in the United States, generally superseded the common-law offense of brawling in church. As generally defined, it consists in any willful interference, by acts or words, with the good order of persons assembled for religious worship, whether within a consecrated place of worship or elsewhere. The offense may be committed by a person present in the place of worship, or by noisy conduct on the outside, and to constitute such acts or conduct a disturbance, it is not necessary that the congregation assembled shall at the time be engaged in worship. It is sufficient if they are assembled for that purpose. The offense constitutes a misdemeanor, punishable by fine or imprisonment. It is not such a violation of private rights as to furnish grounds for an action for damages, unless it be habitual or so persistent as to amount to a nuisance. In that case the remedy by action lies in the hands of the trustees or other officers in whom the possession of the place of worship is vested. See Nuisance.
DISUSE. One of the negative, but yet important, factors of evolution is disuse. Its significance was first pointed out by Lamarck in his first law of evolution, wherein he says that the constant lack of use of an organ “imperceptibly weakens it, causes it to become reduced, progressively diminishes its faculties, and ends in
