New Mexico Territorial Laws and Treaties NM TERR LAWS KEARNY CODE CT & J POWERS § 21

The several prefects shall have exclusive original jurisdiction in all cases relative to the probate of last wills and testaments; the granting letters testamentary and of administration, and the repealing the same; the appointing and displacing guardians of orphans and persons of unsound minds; to binding out apprentices; to settlement and allowance of the accounts of executors, administrators and guardians; to hear and determine all controversies respecting wills, the right of executorship, administration or guardianship, respecting the duties or accounts of executors, administrators and guardians and all controversies between master and those bound to them; to hear and determine all suits and proceedings instituted against executors or administrators upon any demand against the estate of their testator or intestate, provided that when any such demand shall exceed one hundred dollars the claimant may sue either before the prefect or in the circuit court, in the first place.

The prefect shall have a superintendence of public roads in his county, may appoint overseers and allot them hands for the purpose of establishing and repairing the same; he shall have the supervision of vagrants and those who have no visible means of support, and may have them arrested and tried by a jury, and in case of conviction, put to hard labor by binding them out or placing them on public works for not more than three months; he shall have appellate jurisdiction from the judgment of the alcaldes where the amount in controversy, or the value of the thing claimed does not exceed fifty dollars; appeals shall be allowed from all judgments of the prefect to the circuit court, provided that all judgments, in cases of appeals from the decision of alcaldes, shall be final and conclusive.