“ In its present form the constitution confers suffrage upon every male citizen of the United States who is twenty-one years of age or over and has resided in the state six months and in his township or ward twenty days immediately preceding an election; and any woman may vote in an election involving the direct expenditure of public money or the issue of bonds if she have the qualifications of male electors and if she have property assessed for taxes in any part of the district or territory affected by the election in question. ”

“ The qualified electors of each district having an ungraded school elect a moderator, a director and a treasurer—one at each annual school meeting—for a term of three years, who constitute the district school board, and this board is entrusted with ample power for directing the affairs of the school. ”

“ The present banking law provides that the capital stock of a state bank shall be not less than $20,000 in a city of not more than 1500 inhabitants, not less than $25,000 in a city of not more than 5000, not less than $50,000 in a city of between 5000 and 20,000, not less than $100,000 in a city of between 20,000 and 110,000, and not less than $250,000 in all larger cities. ”

“ In a district having more than 100 children of school age a graded school under the control of five trustees is formed whenever two-thirds of the electors vote for it at a town meeting, and the trustees of a graded school may establish a high school whenever a majority of the electors authorize them to do so. A high school may also be established in any township in which there is no incorporated village or city if when the question is submitted to the electors of that township a majority of the votes cast are in the affirmative. ”

“ The supervisor is also the township assessor, and the several township supervisors constitute the county board of supervisors who equalize property valuations as between townships, authorize townships to borrow money with which to build or repair bridges, are entrusted with the care and management of the property and business of the county, and may borrow or raise by tax what is necessary to meet the more common expenses of the county. ”

“ The white inhabitants, still mostly French, were subjected to an English rule that until the Quebec Act of 1774 was chiefly military, and as a consequence many of the more thrifty sought homes elsewhere, and the Indians, most of whom had been allies of the French, were so ill-treated, both by the officers and traders, that under Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, a simultaneous attack on the English posts was planned. ”

“ Next in value among the mineral products is copper; there are about twenty copper mines in Keweenaw peninsula and its vicinity. The Calumet and Hecla mine, in the central part of that peninsula, is probably the most profitable copper mine in the world; up to 1909 it had paid about $107,850,000 in dividends. Copper mining in the state began about the same time as iron mining, and the quantity mined increased from 12 long tons in 1845 to 102,543 in 1906 (in 1907, 97,175 long tons) . From 1847 to 1887 the product of Michigan exceeded that of any other state ”

“ A board of railway commissioners, which in 1907 succeeded a commissioner (whose office was created in 1873) hears complaints, has power to issue various orders and permits of minor importance to railway companies, and reports annually to the governor. [5] The legislature is empowered to appoint a commission to fix transportation rates for railways and express companies. ”

“ The large number of hostile Indians was also a factor in making the Territory unattractive. But during the efficient administration of Lewis Cass, governor of the Territory from 1813 to 1831, the interference of the British was checked and many of the Indians were removed to the west of the Mississippi; printing presses, established during the same period at Detroit, Ann Arbor, Monroe and Pontiac, became largely instrumental in making the country better known ”

“ Throughout the state July is invariably the warmest month, February the coldest, the mean annual temperature is about 45° F. The mean annual precipitation is not far from 31 in., a little more than one-half of which falls during the five growing months from May to October; the rain is evenly distributed over all parts of the state, but the snow is exceptionally heavy along the north shore of the upper peninsula. ”

“ Both the state government and the national government have established hatcheries within the state, and state laws protect the industry by regulating the size of mesh in the nets used, prescribing the size of fish that may be taken and kept, establishing close seasons for several kinds of fish, and by other limitations. ”

“ Cities and villages are permitted—upon authorization by the affirmative vote of three-fifths of the electors voting on the question—to own and operate, even outside their corporate limits, public utilities for supplying water, light, heat, power and transportation, and may sell and deliver, outside their corporate limits, water, heat, power and light to an amount not more than one-fourth that furnished by them in each case within their corporate limits ”

“ No bill can pass either house except by an affirmative vote of a majority of the members elected to that house, and on its third reading the ayes and noes must be taken and recorded; for appropriation bills a two-thirds majority of all members elected to each house is required. ”

“ Minerals.—Of the mineral products (for which the state is noted) iron is the most valuable. This mineral was discovered in the Marquette district along the shore of Lake Superior early in the 18th century, but active operations for mining it did not begin until 1845; in 1877 mining of the same mineral began farther south in the Menominee district, and seven years later farther west along the Wisconsin border in Gogebic county. The annual product steadily increased from 3000 long tons in 1854 to 11,830,342 in 1907 ”

“ Population.—The population of Michigan in 1880 was 1,636,937; in 1890 it was 2,093,889, an increase of 27·9% within the decade; in 1900 it was 2,420,982, a further increase of 15·6% and in 1910, according to the preliminary returns of the U.S. census, it was 2,810,173. Of the total population in 1900, 2,398,563 or 99·07% were whites, 15,861 were negroes, 6354 were Indians, 240 were Chinese, and 9 were Japanese. ”