Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 14.djvu/152

MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT. officer to the council, or perhaps a kind of mayor's assistant. Legal advice to the municipal authorities in the United States is given by an officer styled the corporation counsel, and suits are prosecuted and defended by a city attorney, although the two classes of service may be rendered by one man, and the names vary in different localities. The city engineer is everywhere a trained man, and municipal engineering has become a distinct branch of the engineering profession. In the large cities the legal and engineering work is so extensive and important as to require large staffs of experts. This is also the case in the financial department, using the latter term to embrace all the executive officers employed in assessing, collecting, and disbursing money, and in maintaining a check on collections and disbursements.

. Under this head Ordinary Revenues include the proceeds of taxes, special assessments for benefits, like the frontage tax for street paving, and various licenses and fees. Extraordinary Revenue includes money from loans, bond issues, and trust funds or bequests. Some cities of Continental Europe receive no little revenue from landed property, and the cities of Great Britain and Germany, and a few in the United States, derive considerable revenue from municipal franchises. Where municipal ownership prevails in British cities effort is often made to turn into the common treasury a revenue for the reduction of the general tax rate. In the United States a portion of the revenue from water-works, and less frequently from municipal industries, is sometimes applied in a similar manner. The taxing power is generally limited to the council, the chief exceptions being the education and poor authorities in Great Britain, which have an independent power of taxation. In the United States the councils often have to raise large sums by taxation for independent boards, and also for the county and for the State. It is common for the independent boards to incur bonded indebtedness without consulting the council, but only as the authority, in general or specific terms, is granted by the State Legislature. The sub-departments under the general head of finance are tax assessors, who place a valuation on taxable property; a board of review or appeals from the rulings of the last-named officers; tax collectors; the treasurer, who receives money from the collectors; the disbursing officer or controller, who issues or approves warrants for the payment of bills and claims; and the auditing department. In some cities, particularly the smaller ones, the treasurer is also the disbursing officer, and the council instead of a controller may approve claims. The municipal budget, or the estimate of receipts and expenditures upon which the tax rate and appropriations are based, is prepared according to various methods. In general, the several departments make up their respective estimates, and these are amended by the mayor, or by a special board created for that purpose, and sent to the council for further amendment and final ratification.

The municipality being a mere creature of the State, its area, powers, and form of government are laid down by the Legislature in the form of (1) a specific act or charter; (2) a given act for cities of a given class; or (3) a series of either general acts relating to groups of cities or to all municipal corporations;

or (4) special legislation on any subject and at any time that suits the wishes of the Legislature. Strictly speaking, the first only is a city charter, but the other grants of power have the same general effect, except that 3 and 4 are successively more confusing and less satisfactory than 1 and 2. In the United States city charters may or may not be, as the Legislature sees fit, submitted to popular vote for approval. Frequently both charters and charter amendments are so submitted, and where general municipal corporation acts prevail the transition from one class to another is generally by popular vote, but it may follow from an increase in population. As a rule, voters of a municipality have some voice or influence in framing new or amending old charters, except perhaps where general legislation prevails. This participation goes so far in some cases as to permit the framing of the designed changes by an authorized charter commission or to the adoption of changes requested by the municipal officials. In Missouri, California, and Washington, charter-making is virtually under the control of the municipality, subject to more or less specific legislative restrictions. Far more commonly, the respective legislatures pass enabling acts, which may or may not be in the nature of charter amendments, and leave their adoption to the popular vote.

A comprehensive term used in discussions of municipal affairs is Municipal Reform. This is nothing more or less than an effort, to secure honest and efficient municipal government. The problem varies with each locality, and even changes in a given locality from year to year. The bane of municipal government is partisan politics. The remedy for bad municipal government, from whatever cause, invariably lies with the citizens and taxpayers, who are often too indifferent to their own interests, or at least to the public interest, to insist on good government. A decided reform in municipal affairs was effected in Scotland in 1833, and in England and Wales in 1835, as a result of agitation directed against incompetent and corrupt borough government. The reform acts of the year named were supplemented from time to time, and in 1882 a consolidated municipal corporations act was passed. In 1888 another act was passed, providing that cities and towns of more than 50,000 inhabitants should be administrative counties, and also creating a more unified government for Greater London, known as the London County Council. In 1900 this unification was carried still further, but only to the extent of reducing by consolidation into some fifteen borough governments a large number of minor authorities. In the United States the progress of municipal reform, as reflected by changed methods of administration, is difficult to trace. This is largely due to the many independent State legislatures controlling municipal affairs, to the great variations of practice within each State, and to the spasmodic efforts for reform. One of the notable steps in many States has been the adoption of constitutional amendments, from 1850 to 1880, prohibiting special acts of the Legislature which apply to a single municipality. Other great agencies of municipal reform in the United States have been the various local reform organizations, notable among which have lieen the good government clubs, and their federation into the National Municipal League.