Note 950 — Chapter XV · DIVORCE IN THE AMERICAN COLONIES
Reading edition
It is ordered "that such of the magistrates as shall reside in or near Boston, or any 5, 4, or 3 of them, the Governor or Deputy to be one, shall have power to assemble together upon the last fifth day of the eighth, eleventh, second, and fifth month, every year, and then and there to hear and determine all civil causes whereof the debt or trespass and damages shall not exceed £20, and all criminal causes not extending to life, or member, or banishment, according to the course of the Courts of Assistants, and to summon juries out of the neighboring towns."—Mass. Col. Rec., I, 276. In 1648 the number of such courts was reduced to two: ibid., II, 286; III, 175.