Starosta

“ A city of the second class must elect a mayor and twelve councilmen, and its mayor must appoint a police judge, an attorney, a street commissioner and a chief of police. A city of the third class must elect a mayor, seven councilmen, a treasurer, a health officer, a clerk and an attorney, and its mayor must apoint a marshal, a police justice and as many policemen as the council provides for. An incorporated town must elect a mayor, five councilmen and a treasurer, and its mayor must appoint a marshal and a clerk. ”

“ Every town has a mayor, or chief magistrate, called beglerbegi, “lord of lords,” kalantar, “the greater,” and sometimes darogha, “overseer,” or chief of police; every ward or parish, mahalleh, of a town and every village has a head-man called ked khoda, “house-lord.” These officers are responsible to the governor for the collection of the taxes and the orderly state of their towns, parishes and villages. In the important provinces and subprovinces the governors are assisted by a man of experience, to whom the accounts and details of the government are entrusted. ”

“ In case the mayor and president shall be absent from any meeting of the common council, they shall proceed to elect a temporary presiding officer, who, for the time being, shall discharge the duties of mayor. The president, or temporary presiding officer, while presiding over the council or performing the duties of mayor, shall be styled 'acting mayor,' and acts performed by them shall have the same force and validity as if performed by the mayor.' 'Chapter 3, § 3. ”

“ The corporate authority of said city shall be vested in one principal officer, styled the 'mayor;' in one board of aldermen, consisting of two members from each ward, who, with the mayor, shall be denominated the common council. ”

“ Tradition declares that the mayor, when he had [193] read the Proclamation, drank ale from a silver flagon, and that thereupon the bustle and business of the fair began. I believe as a matter of fact the proclamation was usually read by the Lord Mayor’s attorney, and repeated after him by the sheriff’s officer, in the presence of the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and sheriffs. The officers of the Lord Mayor’s household afterwards dined at the Sword-bearer’s table. This may have become the custom at a later date. See 1688. ”

“ But everywhere the people have waived the right or privilege of a logical government when they have illogically insisted upon selecting their officers locally. When the district attorney, for instance, is chosen by the electors of the county he may be legally the state’s representative but he is practically a local officer in very much the same sense as the mayor. ”

“ The chief executive officer of a city is a mayor. A city is divided into wards of convenient size, in each of which are chosen one or more aldermen, (usually two,) and such other officers as are named in the charter. The mayor and aldermen constitute the common council, which is a kind of legislature, having the power to pass such laws, (commonly called ordinances,) and to make such orders and regulations, as the government of the city requires. ”

“ ADMINISTRATIVE DUTIES OF THE MAYOR.—The mayor stands at the head of the city administration, but the extent of his control varies from city to city. In the last half century the decline in popular favor of the city council has been accompanied by a growing tendency to enlarge the administrative powers of the mayor. In many of the smaller cities the mayor is still little more than a presiding officer of the council. In such cities subordinate executive officials are usually chosen by popular vote or are appointed by the council. ”

“ The Mayor, therefore, is the chief executive officer of the city and he either appoints solely, or with the consent of the city council in some instances, the city officers not constitutionally required to be elected. ”

“ This municipal assembly shall be the Council of Administration, which shall establish for the entire extent of its jurisdiction the rules of the common regime, and shall decide on all that concerns the municipal police, its internal security, sanitary policy, the management and use of municipal revenues, local expenditures, and generally all that is within the jurisdiction of the municipalities.
Art. 43. The active power shall be entirely, and for all the extent of the municipal district, in the hands of the mayor and his lieutenant, who shall be elected immediately by the primary assemblies. ”

“ But on the other hand, the Aldermen shewed by many reasons, that unto them belongs the election of Mayor, both because they, the Aldermen are the heads, as it were, and the populace the limbs, as also because it is the Aldermen who pronounce judgments in pleas moved within the City. Of the populace on the other hand there are many who have neither lands, rents, nor dwellings in the City, being sons of divers mothers, some of them of servile station, and all of them caring little or nothing about the City’s welfare. ”

“ Let us make our own selections—or, rather, help our mayor to make hers—and show this town what can be done with an honest and sane council, every man of whom has at heart the framing of a model municipality and the development of an ideal city. ”

“ State constitutions contain many provisions in regard to this local government, but the legislature can make laws affecting it more or less greatly in the various states. In the local government of a city, town, or county there is to some extent a distribution of powers among legislative, executive, and judicial officers. The legislative function is exercised by the city council or board of aldermen, the town trustees (or by the whole body of voters) , and the county board of supervisors or commissioners; the executive, by the city mayor, the county sheriff, and other officers ”

“ In other parishes, municipal administrations shall be composed of a mayor and two administrators; a substitute commissary of the responsible tribunal shall hold the function of commissary near the municipality gratuitously.
Art. 49. Members of these municipal administrations shall be nominated for two years; they may always continue beyond that time. Their nomination devolves to the Governor, who, on a list of at least sixteen individuals, presented by each municipal administration, chooses the persons most appropriate to manage the affairs of each parish. ”

“ The recorder made a speech to the livery-men, 'apprising them of the custom and manner of choosing a lord mayor; which, he observed, was for the Common Hall to nominate two of the aldermen who had served sheriffs, to the Court of Aldermen, who had then a right to elect either of them into that great office, and which ever that the court so fixed on, the Common Hall was bound to accept.' When he had ended, the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen retired into the Council Chamber, and left us to preside at the election, attended by the Common Sergeant and other officers. ”

“ The presence of the village officers tends to preserve the peace and make crime less frequent.
OFFICERS.--The usual officers of the village or borough are the trustees or councilmen, whose duties are mostly legislative; the marshal, and sometimes a president or mayor; a collector and a treasurer, whose duties are executive; and the recorder, or police judge, or justices of the peace, whose duties are judicial. The officers are usually elected by the legal voters, and serve for a term of one or two years. ”

“ The city government is vested in a mayor, elected every two years, a municipal council, and the usual administrative departments, all appointed by the executive, and all, excepting that of public works, where the power is given to a single head, governed by boards. ”

“ Their chief officers are a Burgomaster, like our Mayor, twenty-four Senators, like our Common Council, and a Syndic, as our Recorder. These are the chief Council and Judicatory of the city, and order all the public affairs thereof; only in some extraordinary occasions of making laws or foreign treaties, matters of war and peace, the people of the town make choice of deputies, sometimes forty or fifty,—more or less, as they please,—who sit and consult with the Senate, and by their votes by the people, who willingly submit thereunto. ”

“ The municipal and internal affairs are managed by a provincial assembly elected by the people. Every villa or borough throughout the province also possesses its municipal council, and in thinly-populated districts, the inhabitants choose every four years a justice of the peace who adjudicates in small disputes between neighbours. ”

“ The law names certain things which each city charter shall provide, and imposes certain restrictions on the powers of cities. There must be an elected Mayor and a body vested with legislative power; the clerk, treasurer, and assessors, and other officers may be elected or appointed. This permits the establishment of a commission system, or of a Mayor and council with distinct powers. Provision must be made for the levy, collection, and return of State, county, and school taxes, for annual appropriations for municipal purposes, and for a system of accounts. ”

“ Every large town has a mayor and deputy mayor, appointed by the government, and a town council, of whom one third are similarly appointed, while the citizens choose the rest; a proportionate number of councillors representing each religious community. ”

“ The Council was ordained to consist of “a Mayor, six Aldermen, and eighteen Councillors, to be respectively elected at such times and places, and in such manner” as those of other boroughs existing under the same acts, in common with which they “shall have, exercise, and enjoy all the powers, immunities, and privileges, and be subject to the same duties, penalties, liabilities, and disqualifications” appertaining to such positions. ”

“ All other officers, whose election or appointment is not provided for by this constitution, and all officers whose offices may hereafter be created by law, shall be elected by the people, or appointed as the legislature may direct. Nothing in this section shall prevent the transfer in whole or in part, of the functions of any town or village officer to any county officer, or the transfer in whole or in part of the function of any county officer to any town or village officer. ”

“ The mayor, aldermen and councillors, before entering upon the duties of their offices, shall take and subscribe an oath or affirmation that they will support the Constitution of the United States and of this State, and that they will well and truly perform the duties of their offices to the best of their will and abilities. ”

“ The executive powers, which in the country districts are vested in the fogeds, in the towns are committed to the judges of the courts of first instance. The management of the affairs of the parish is placed in the hands of a council, chosen by the peasants, which deliberates on all matters which concern the parish, such as the making of new roads, the application to the central government for assistance, and the repairing of the parish church. ”

“ The sheriff of every county, having received his writ, ought, forthwith, to send his precepts and summons to the mayors, bailiffs, and head officers of every city, town corporate, borough, and such places as have been accustomed to send burgesses within his county, that they do choose and elect among themselves two citizens for every city, and two burgesses for every borough, according to their old custom and usage. ”

“ James II. converted the Alderman into a Mayor by a charter of 1685. In April 1688, however, a Quo warranto summons was served on the Mayor; and in the following November the Corporation, taking advantage of the banished King’s proclamation which restored such bodies to their ancient rights, reverted to their old state. Their later constitution included an Alderman, twelve senior and twelve junior Comburgesses. For these the Municipal Reform Act of 1835 substituted a Mayor, four Aldermen, and twelve Councillors. ”

“ It is privileged with the jurisdiction of a court leet and quarterly sessions of the peace, within the same, before the mayor, recorder, and eight aldermen, or magistrates, and a town-clerk. The mayor to be 254 chosen out of the eight Magistrates that are free-men; and also with sending two Members, to sit as their Representatives in Parliament, who are to be chosen by the Mayor, Magistrates, and Freemen, or the major part of them; by election of which, if common fame be true, the townsmen have in the last ages reaped great gain and advantage. ”

“ A borough was run by a mayor elected usually for life. By being members of a guild, merchant-traders and craftsmen acquired the legal status of burgesses and had the freedom of the borough. Each guild occupied a certain ward of the town headed by an alderman. The town aldermen made up the town council, which advised the mayor. ”

“ A mayor and various other executive officers and a legislative unicameral council are elected for four years. The mayor and the heads of departments consult as a “cabinet.” Various boards—of civil service, public debt, education, health, police, fire, drainage, water and sewerage and state commissioners of the port—control many of the most important interests of the city. ”

“ It is a mistake to think lightly of the importance of municipal office, or of the responsibilities which are attached to it, either on the part of the citizen, who, as a member of the council, conducts the affairs of the town, or of the citizen who plays the part of taxpayer—and complainant in general. ”