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Home » Law Dictionary » H » HEAD

HEAD

TheLaw.com Law Dictionary & Black's Law Dictionary 2nd Ed.

Chief; leading; principal; the upper part or principal source of a stream. Head money. A sum of money reckoned at a fixed amount for each head (person) in a designated class. Particularly (1) a capitation or poll tax. (2) A bounty offered by the laws of the United States for each person on board an enemy’s ship or vessel, at the commencement of a naval engagement, which shall be sunk or destroyed by a ship or vessel of the United States of equal or inferior force, the same to be divided among the officers and crew in the same manner as prise money. In re Farragut, 7 D. C 97. A similar reward is offered by the British statutes. (3) The tax or duty imposed by act of congress of Aug. 3, 1882, on owners of steamships and sailing vessels for every immigrant brought into the United States. Head Money Cases, 112 U. S. 580, 5 Sup. Ct. 247, 28 L. Ed. 798. (4) A bounty or reward paid to one who pursues and kills a bandit or outlaw and produces his head as evidence; the offer of such a reward being popularly called “nutting a price on his head.”-Bead of erech. This term means the source of the longest branch, unless general reputation has given the appellation to another, Davis v. Bryant 2 Bibb (Ky.) 110. Head of department. In the constitution and laws of the United States, the heads of departments are the officers at the head of the great executive departments of government (commonly called “the cabinet”) such as the secretary of state, secretary of the interior, attorney general, postmaster general, and so on, not including heads of bureaus. U. S. v. Mouatt. 124 U. S. 303, 8 Sup. Ct 505, 31 L Ed. 463; U. S. v. Germaine, 99 U. S. 511, 25 L. Ed. 482. Head of a family. A term used in homestead and exemption laws to designate a person who maintains a family; a householder. Not necessarily a husband or father, but any person who bas charge of, supervises, and manages the affairs of the household or the collective body of persons residing together and constituting the family. See Duncan v. Frank, 8 Mo. App. 289; Jarboe v. Jarboe. 106 Mo. App. 459, 79 S. W. 1163; Whalen v. Cadman. 11 Iowa. 227: Brokaw v. Ogle, 170 111. 115, 48 N. B. 394; Bennett v. Georgia Trust Co., 106 Ga. 578. 32 S. Et 625. Head of stream. The highest point on the stream which furnishes a continuous stream of water, not necessarily the longest fork or prong. Uhl v. Reynolds, 64 S. W. 498. 23 Ky. Law Rep. 759; State v. Coleman, 13 N. J. Law, 104. Head of water. In hydraulic engineering, mining, etc., the effective force of a body or volume of water, expressed in terms of the vertical distance from the level of the water in the pond, reservoir, dam, or other source of supply, to the point where it is to be mechanically applied, or expressed in terms of the pressure of the water per square inch at the latter point. See Shearer v. Middleton. 88 Mich. 621. 50 N. W. 737: Cargill v. Thompson, 57 Minn. 534, 59 N. W. 638.

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