Page:The Constitutions and Other Select Documents Illustrative of the History of France, 1789-1907, Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged.pdf/307

Rh taken from among the members of the Council of State.

These orators are never sent to the number of more than three for the defence of a single project of law.

54. The ministers procure the execution of the laws and regulations of public administration.

55. No edict of the government can have effect unless it is signed by a minister.

56. One of the ministers is especially charged with the administration of the public treasury: he provides for the security of the receipts, and orders the transfer of funds and the payments authorised by law. He cannot make any payment except in virtue of: 1st, a law, and to the amount of the funds which it has fixed for that kind of expenses; 2d, an order of the government; 3d, a warrant signed by a minister.

57. The detailed accounts of the expenses of each minister, signed and certified by him, are made public.

58. The government can select or retain as councillors of state and as ministers, only the citizens whose names are enrolled upon the national list.

59. The local administrations established either for each communal district or for more extended portions of territory are subordinate to the ministers. No one can become or remain a member of these administrations unless he is placed or kept upon one of the lists mentioned in articles 7 and 8.

Title V. Of the Tribunals.

60. Each communal district has one or more justices of the peace, elected directly by the citizens for three years.

Their principal duty consists in conciliating the parties, whom they urge, in case of non-conciliation, to get judgment by arbitrators.

61. In civil matters there are tribunals of first instance and tribunals of appeal. The law determines the organization of each of them, their competency, and the territory forming the jurisdiction of each.

62. In criminal matters involving afflictive or ignominious punishments, a first jury accepts or rejects the accusation: if it is accepted, a second jury passes upon the facts, and the judges forming a criminal tribunal impose the penalty. Their judgment is without appeal.

63. The duty of public prosecution before a criminal tri-