Page:1887 Compiled Laws of Dakota Territory.pdf/174

County Officers § 575. The commissioners shall hold their office for the term of three years, except as provided in the statute for the organization of counties, and one shall retire and one be chosen annually, and in counties now organized the order of their election and succession shall remain as now established, and commissioner districts in such counties shall continue as now constituted until changed as provided by law.

§ 576. Whenever one-third of the legal voters of any organized county of this territory petition the county commissioners that they desire five county commissioners for said county, and that said county be divided into five commissioner's districts, it is hereby made the duty of such county commissioners to call the judge of probate and county clerk together within twenty days. The said county commissioners, judge of probate, and county clerk (provided said commissioners are not the commissioners appointed in organizing the county) are hereby constituted a commission and authorized to carry out the provisions of section 577.

§ 577. Upon the meeting of the commission herein [above] provided for, they shall take and subscribe an oath to perform their duty impartially and for the best interest of such county, and elect one of their number chairman and one secretary of the commission; their proceedings shall be reduced to writing and signed by all the members and filed with the county clerk. They shall then consider the petition of such legal voters, and if satisfied that at least one-third of the legal voters of such county as shown by the last election returns has petitioned them, then such commission shall proceed to divide such county into five districts, and so divide it that no two of the then acting commissioners shall reside in one district; they shall then appoint a commissioner for each of the two districts that have no commissioner residing therein, who shall hold their offices until the next general or annual election and until their successors are elected and qualified, the then acting commissioners to continue to hold their respective offices until the term for which they are elected expires. The districts shall be numbered one, two, three, four and five, and the districts in which no acting commissioners reside shall be numbered four and five and at the first general or annual election the commissioner for district number four shall be elected for two years and the commissioner for district number five for three years, and when the terms of office of the commissioners who have been elected (or appointed to fill a vacancy of an elected commissioner) expires, their successors shall be elected for the term of three years, each of whom shall be a resident of the district he is to represent and to be voted for only by the electors of said district.

§ 578. The board of county commissioners shall procure and keep a seal with such emblems and devices as they may think proper, which shall be the seal of the county, and no other seal shall be used by the county clerk; and the impression of the seal hereby required to be kept, by the stamp, shall be sufficient sealing in all cases where sealing is required.

§ 579. The county commissioners shall meet and hold sessions for the transaction of business at the court houses in their respective counties, or at the usual place of holding court, on the first Mondays in January, April, July and October of each year,

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