Northern Mariana Islands

“ The salary of members may be changed no more than once every four years and only upon the recommendation of an advisory commission established by law to make recommendations concerning the compensation of Commonwealth executive, legislative and judicial officers. No change in the salary may be made that exceeds the percentage change in an accepted composite price index for the period since the last change. An increase in salary may not apply to the legislature that enacted it. ”

“ The mission of the college shall be to provide the best quality and meaningful postsecondary and adult educational opportunities for the purpose of improving the quality of life for the individual and for the Commonwealth as a whole. The college shall be responsible for providing education in the areas of adult and continuing education, postsecondary and adult vocational education and professional development for the people of the Commonwealth. ”

“ In the annual appropriations acts, the legislature shall establish ceilings on the number of persons that may be employed by each branch, department, agency, authority and public corporation of the Commonwealth to which public funds are appropriated. Except upon specific approval by joint resolution of the legislature, no public funds may be expended for personnel in excess of the ceilings so established. ”

“ Upon the petition of any person qualified to vote, the Commonwealth appeals court or the United States District Court if no Commonwealth appeals court has been created under section 3 of article IV has original and exclusive jurisdiction to review a plan and to amend it to comply with the requirements of this Constitution or to establish a plan if the governor has failed to act within the time provided. ”

“ In case of the removal, death, or resignation of the governor, the lieutenant governor shall become governor and the president of the senate shall become lieutenant governor. If the offices of governor and lieutenant governor are both vacant, the president of the senate shall become acting governor and the speaker of the house shall become acting lieutenant governor. An acting governor or lieutenant governor who assumes office when more than one year remains in the term may serve only until a governor or lieutenant governor is chosen in a special election provided by law. ”

“ In every case where the governor appoints a board or commission to perform a regulatory or administrative function or direct the activities of an agency, authority, or public or quasi-public corporation in the performance of a regulatory or administrative function, the members of such a board or commission shall be independent and may be removed only on grounds of gross neglect or dereliction of duty, breach of fiduciary duty, conviction of a felony, or mental or physical incapacity. ”

“ The corporation shall make available some portion of the public lands for a homestead program. A person is not eligible for more than one agricultural and one village homestead. A person may not receive a freehold interest in a homestead for three years after the grant of a homestead and may not transfer a freehold interest in a homestead for ten years after receipt except that these requirements are waived for persons who have established a continuous use of public lands for at least fifteen years as of the effective date of this Constitution. ”

“ The waters of the archipelago's northern islands are among the most biologically diverse in the Western Pacific and include the greatest diversity of seamount and hydrothermal vent life yet discovered. ”

“ This patache made a very prosperous voyage; for, having passed the Marianas Islands, which is the most difficult part of this navigation, and finding that their provisions were nearly gone, and that it was almost impossible to pursue their voyage, [311] divine Providence aided them by revealing to them an unknown island, not set down on any navigation chart. ”

“ The largest is Rey Island, which is about 17 m. long, north to south, and 8 m. broad, with an extreme elevation of 600 ft. The other larger islands are San José, Pedro Gonzales, Casaya, Saboga and Pacheca. There are several fishing villages whose inhabitants are largely engaged in the pearl fisheries, and a number of cocoa-nut plantations. The islands belong chiefly to Panama merchants. There are several groups of small islands on the northern coast, and a few small islands so near the mainland as to form sheltered harbours, as at Cartagena. ”

“ In a good year, namely a rainy year, the island grows a very good wheat crop, almost larger than that of any other island, but the absence of fresh-water springs, or the apathy of the natives in not making use of [152] what there are, has prevented any agricultural development. The island has no pine forest and trees are scarce: great parts of it are barren, sandy and rocky plains, and the little vegetation there is, is said to resemble that which is found in certain parts of the northern deserts of Africa. Its highest point is only about 2700 ft. ”

“ When it happens that they are occupied in one place, fulfilling the functions of their ministry, they are not able to assist those who die in the other. I have been still more greatly moved by the forsaken condition in which we found several other persons, who died in the islands that are called Pais. Although these islands are not far from the Marianas, their inhabitants have no intercourse with those of the latter group. ”

“ The heat, however, is greatly modified on the coast by the south-east trade winds, and the climate is generally considered healthy, though beri-beri and eruptive diseases are common on the coast. The coast itself is broken and dangerous, there being many small indentations, which are usually masked by islands or shoals. The largest of these are the Bay of Tury-assú, facing which is the island of São João, and several others of small size, and the contiguous bays of São Marcos and São José, between which is the large island of Maranhão. ”

“ We beat up between Maria Island and the main land. The coast of the latter was steep and woody. Some parts of Maria Island are lofty: the northern end is 3,000 feet high, and steep: the island is divided into two portions by a low sandy neck. Black-fish, Gannets, and Mutton-birds were seen; and in the evening, we were cheered by lights on the coast, at the house of a settler, and at a whaling station, in Spring Bay. The last proved of great service in directing the course of the cutter, which dropped anchor at midnight, the wind having failed. ”

“ The group lies between the south end of New Ireland and the north end of the great Bougainville Island in the Solomon Archipelago, and consists of six low, well-wooded and fertile islands, enclosed within a barrier reef, forming a noble atoll, almost circular in shape. All the islands are thickly populated at the present day by natives, who are peaceable enough, and engage in bêche-de-mer and pearl-shell fishing. ”

“ Providence Island lies two hundred and forty miles from the Amirante Islands, in a south-west-by-south direction, and is two hundred miles north-east-by-north from the northern extremity of Madagascar. It is entirely of coral formation, is low and flat, and measures two miles in length by one-third of a mile in width. It is surrounded with broad submerged fringing reefs, which at [232] the southern extremity of the island are continuous with a long reef, extending in a southerly direction for a distance of sixteen miles, and partially dry at low tide. ”

“ The numerous islands, very many of which are uninhabited, have yet their recorded names, more or less characteristic, such as Rum Key, Turk's Island,—famous for the export of salt,—Bird Rock, Fortune Island, Great and Little Inagua, Crooked Island, and so on, all more or less noted for the disastrous wrecks which have occurred on their low coralline shores. Our Northern cities are largely dependent upon the Bahamas for their early annual supplies of pineapples, cocoanuts, oranges, bananas, and some vegetables, in which they are all more or less prolific. ”

“ The carpenters declare the ship in such good condition that the captain and supercargo resolve to explore the Loyalty and New Hebrides, and other groups in that direction, before seeking our final port. These islands are especially rich in sandal-wood, with which it is resolved we shall fill up. The first land we make is Marè—one of the Loyalty Islands—a low coral island, about seventy miles in circumference. The inhabitants are almost black, and a more brutalised savage race we have not yet seen. There are four tribes constantly at war with each other—the victors always eating their captives. ”

“ Where the isolation of the island is more pronounced, owing either to a broader and more dangerous channel, as in the case of Madagascar and Formosa, or to the nautical incapacity of the neighboring coast peoples, as in the case of Tasmania and the Canary Islands, the ethnic influence of the mainland is weak, and the ethnic divergence of the insular population therefore more marked, even to the point of total difference in race. ”

“ On the topography of the island, I shall not retail what is told by those who recite its history, nor have I ever had leisure to inspect it. It is, I believe, considered the richest, as well as the largest of all the islands, except Cuba; and nature seems to have lavished on it the advantages which are but partial in the others. It extends about 400 miles in length, and is more than 70 in breadth, yet completely peopled. Its natural defence is unequalled, being entirely fortified by vast rocks and extensive shoals. ”

“ In speaking of skulls, Dr. Keith makes the interesting remark that the Islanders are the largest-brained people yet discovered in the islands or shores of the Pacific, and shows that their cranial capacity exceeds that of the inhabitants of Whitechapel.
In the culture of the island also, the Melanesian influence is very strong. The custom of distending the lobe of the ear is much more Melanesian than Polynesian. Dr. Haddon has pointed out that an early illustration of an Easter Island canoe depicts it with a double outrigger, after a type found in the Nissan group in Melanesia. ”