The state of Maine is looking into appealing a recent Virginia court decision which ruled against Maine and the town of Wiscasset.

In a Nineteenth Judicial Circuit Court decision dated February 22, 2008, a judge ruled against Maine in its claim to return a 1776 printed copy of the Declaration of Independence to the town of Wiscasset.

Attorney William R. Stokes and attorney Thomas A. Knowlton, representing thbe Maine Office of the Attorney General argued on behalf of the state.

"It was disappointing," Stokes said Tuesday.

"We knew we were in trouble the very first day," he said, "because of the tone of the questions the judge was asking." The case lasted three days.

Stokes said the judge didn't look at the "cumulative effect" of all the links the document had to the town of Wiscasset - most noteworthy, the fact that it was found in the attic of a woman whose father had been a Wiscasset Town Clerk for many years.

"We are in discussions with our local counsel in Virginia to find out what the procedures are in that state for appealing the decision." Unlike Maine, it will not be argued in Superior Court, but rather in the Virginia State Court.

Like the federal Supreme Court, the Virginia Supreme Court does not take all cases referred to it.

The executive council of Massachusetts ordered printed copies of the Declaration to be sent out in July of 1776 to all the churches in Massachusetts which at that time included Maine, to be read by ministers in the churches, then recorded in the town records. One of these was sent to Pownalborough, the original name of Wiscasset. Between 1776 and 1996, 39 different people served as the town clerk of Pownalbrough and Wiscasset. In May of 1995, Harold Moore, an auctioneer, found the Pownalborough Print, as it came to be known, in the attic of a home on Middle Street in Wiscasset. The home had been owned by Anna Plumstead, who lived with her sister, Mildred Holbrook until she died in 1991. Her sister, Anna died in 1994. Their father was Sol Holbrook, who had been the Wiscasset town clerk from 1886 until his death in 1929.

Moore sold the document at auction in Byfield, Mass. in 1995 for $77,000 to David O'Neal, in partnership with Kaller Historical Documents, Inc. In 2001 Kaller sold it to Simon Finch, a rare book dealer in London, for $390,000, and Finch subsequently sold it to the current owner, Richard L. Adams, Jr. for $475,000.

The state of Maine apparently learned of the existence of the document through an anonymous caller, and began proceedings to try to bring it back to Wiscasset in 2004. The case went into court in Virginia because Adams wanted to "quiet" or settle the title.

Attorneys for Adams argued that there was no requirement that the Declarations be kept - only that they be recorded in the town's records as having been received, and therefore the documents could have been given away or disposed of.

"We know it was delivered to the town clerk in Wiscasset," Stokes said. "We know it was not his personal property, because he possessed it as the town clerk. It was given to him in his official capacity as the town clerk - therefore it belonged to the town, not to him. He didn't have the authority to discard it or give it away."

But the most logical and forceful argument that it belonged to the town of Pownalborough or Wiscasset is the fact that it was found in the attic of the daughter of a town clerk.

Attorneys for Adams argued that if the document belonged to the town, it should have been listed in an inventory of documents. "In 1776, we're talking wilderness," Stokes said. "At that time, people were basically just trying to survive."

And, since the Declaration was "incendiary" - a call to arms against their English rulers - it's very possible the colonists might have hidden it away for fear of retribution, he said.

"Perhaps it didn't get turned over to the town because people didn't know where it was," Stokes said.

And, he said, the writing on the back of the document "is not something you would have put on a private document."

As for the argument that Maine did not provide written evidence that the document had ever been owned or in the possession of the town of Wiscasset, Stokes said, "We have no direct evidence that Washington was ever at Valley Forge, either."