Part 56 (2/2)
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT, under the several topics referred to in this chapter.
Teachable Facts about Bolshevism and Sovietism, Inst.i.tute for Public Service, 51 Chambers St., New York City.
CHAPTER XXV
OUR LOCAL GOVERNMENTS
UNITS OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT
When the first colonists of America undertook to organize governments for their local settlements, they naturally adopted forms with which they had been familiar in England. There were two such forms which met their needs, the TOWN, OR TOWNs.h.i.+P, AND THE COUNTY. These have remained to this day the chief units of our local government.
THE NEW ENGLAND TOWN
Geographical conditions were such in New England that the colonists settled in compact communities. There the towns.h.i.+p, or town, was adopted as the more convenient unit. It included a central village and the neighboring farming region with irregular boundaries. It is still the unit of local government throughout rural New England, and in many communities that have grown to the proportion of cities. It has been said of the New England town government that it is ”the fullest and most perfect example of local self-government either then or now in existence ... . The state might fall to pieces, and the town would still supply all the wants of everyday government.” [Footnote: Henry Cabot Lodge, A SHORT HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH COLONIES IN AMERICA, p. 414.]
THE TOWN MEETING
The chief feature of the New England town government is the TOWN MEETING, which is an a.s.semblage of the voters of the town at the town hall (formerly often at the church), the regular annual town meeting being held in the spring or autumn, and special meetings as necessary. These meetings are called by the SELECTMEN (see below) by means of a WARRANT which contains a statement of the business to be transacted. At the annual meeting, reports are heard from the officers of the preceding year, officers for the new year are elected, by-laws (town laws) are enacted, taxes are levied and appropriations made for the various purposes of government. It is direct self-government.
NEW ENGLAND TOWN OFFICERS
Among the officers elected by the town meeting are the selectmen, varying in number from three to nine, who have charge of the town property and are responsible to the town meeting for the conduct of the town's business; a town clerk, who keeps the town records, issues marriage licenses, registers births and deaths, and performs other clerical services; an a.s.sessor of taxes; a treasurer; several constables, who have police duties, execute warrants issued by the selectmen and by the justices of the peace, and sometimes act as tax collectors; school committeemen; overseers of the poor; members of the board of health and of other boards for public service. In some of the New England states the justices of the peace, who are not strictly town officers, are elected by the town meeting.
THE TOWN WARRANT
There is here given a copy of portions of a warrant for a special town meeting. This warrant is very brief as compared with those issued for a regular annual meeting; but it gives an idea of the variety of business transacted.
Town Warrant
MIDDLEs.e.x, SS.
To Henry Atchison, one of the constables of the Town of Framingham or to either of them,
GREETING:
In the name of the Commonwealth of Ma.s.sachusetts, you are hereby required to notify and warn the inhabitants of the Town of Framingham, qualified to vote in elections, and Town affairs, to meet at the Casino in said Framingham, on WEDNESDAY, JULY 16TH, A.D. 1919 at eight o'clock P.M. Then and there to act on the following articles, viz.: Article I. To hear and act upon such reports of any of the officers of the Town or Committees of the Town as may be then and there presented, appropriate money to carry out the recommendations thereof, or any of them, pa.s.s any vote or take any action relative to any of said reports, or any part thereof.
Art. 2. To hear and act on the report of the Committee directed to investigate school needs in the Apple Street District. ...
Art. 3. To see if the Town will vote to instruct the Town Treasurer to place to the credit of the Park Department ... for the care and maintenance of parks and playgrounds, any and all sums of money which may be received by him ... on account of said Department, and authorize the use of the same by said Department. ...
Art. 4. To see if the Town will grant or appropriate a sum not exceeding twenty-five hundred dollars ($2500) for the purchase by the tree warden of a new tree spraying machine. ...
Art. 5. To see if the Town will authorize its Board of Park Commissioners to sell and dispose of two of the unused schoolhouses placed in charge of the Park Commission some years ago. ...
Art. 6. To see if the Town will appropriate the sum of fifty-five hundred dollars ... to be expended under the direction of the following committee ... for the purpose of selecting a site, location and erection of a temporary memorial tablet, and cause to be inscribed thereon the names of the Framingham soldiers, sailors, marines ... and nurses, who gave their lives in the late war. ...
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