Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/427

 CITY COUNCIL OF BERLIN 413

Incidentally this table shows the rapid rate at which wealth is accumulating in Prussia, and the rate at which large fortunes are being built up.

For the purpose of electing the members of the city council the city is divided into districts by classes. The law provides that one-third of the members of each class shall be elected every two years, making the council, therefore, a continuous body, like the senate of the United States ; and it is provided further that, whenever the number of voters in any one class shall exceed 500, the city may be divided into districts for the election of the members belonging to that class.

Under this provision the city of Berlin has been divided into sixteen districts, each electing three members one member, therefore, every two years for the first class ; further, into six- teen districts, each electing three members one, therefore, every two years for the second class; and into forty-eight districts, each electing one member, and, therefore, one every six years for the third class.

The general principle accepted in this division is to divide the city in such a way that, approximately, the same number of voters of the class for which the division is made shall be found in each district. It is evident, therefore, that, if the members of the first class were distributed over the city in the same general ratio as the members of the second class, the boundaries of the districts of the first and second classes might be coterminous. But, as a matter of fact, since this actual distribution of residents is very different, the districting of the members of the first class must be very different from the districting for members of the second class. And this difference is still more marked in the case of districting for the third class, since the residence distribution of the great mass of the voters of the third class is very different from that of the members of the first or second class. The boundaries of these various districts sometimes run together for a short distance. The city, namely, is divided into 362 administrative districts ; and, in making up the districts for the election of councilmen in either of the three classes, these administrative districts must not be divided. So that occasionally