Bricks Without Straw: A Novel

by Albion Winegar Tourgée

"The township system," continued Le Moyne, "may, for the present purpose, be denned to be the division of the entire territory of the state into small municipalises, the inhabitants of which control and manage for themselves, directly and immediately, their own local affairs. Each township is in itself a miniature republic, every citizen of which exercises in its affairs equal power with every other citizen. Each of these miniature republics becomes a constituent element of the higher representative republic—namely, a county, which is itself a component of the still larger representative republic, the State. It is patterned upon and no doubt grew out of the less perfect borough systems of Europe, and those inchoate communes of our Saxon forefathers which were denominated 'Hundreds.' It is the slow growth of centuries of political experience; the ripe fruit of ages of liberty-seeking thought.

"The township is the shield and nursery of individual freedom of thought and action. The young citizen who has never dreamed of a political career becomes interested in some local question affecting his individual interests. A bridge is out of repair; a roadmaster has failed to perform his duty; a constable has been remiss in his office; a justice of the peace has failed to hold the scales with even balance between rich and poor; a school has not been properly cared for; the funds of the township have been squandered; or the assumption of a liability is proposed by the township trustees, the policy of which he doubts. He has the remedy in his own hands. He goes to the township meeting, or he appears at the town-house upon election day, and appeals to his own neighbors—those having like interests with himself. He engages in the struggle, hand to hand and foot to foot with his equals; he learns confidence in himself; he begins to measure his own power, and fits himself for the higher duties and responsibilities of statesmanship."

"Well, well," laughed Goodspeed, "there is something in that. I remember that iny first political experience was in trying to defeat a supervisor who did not properly work the roads of his district; but I had never thought that in so doing I was illustrating such a doctrine as you have put forth."

"No; the doctrine is not mine," said Le Moyne. "Others, and especially that noted French political philosopher who so calmly and faithfully investigated our political system—the author of 'Democracy in America'—clearly pointed out, many years ago, the exceptional value of this institution, and attributed to it the superior intelligence and prosperity of the North."

"Then," was the good-natured reply, "your prescription for the political regeneration of the South is the same as that which we all laughed at as coming from Horace Greeley immediately upon the downfall of the Confederacy—that the Government should send an army of surveyors to the South to lay off the land in sections and quarter-sections, establish parallel roads, and enforce topographic uniformity upon the nation?

"Not at all," said Le Moyne. "I think that the use of the term 'township' in a double sense has misled our political thinkers in estimating its value. It is by no means necessary that the township of the United States survey should be arbitrarily established in every state. In fact, the township system really finds its fullest development where such a land division does not prevail, as in New England, Pennsylvania, and other states. It is the people that require to be laid off in townships, not the land. Arkansas, Missouri, Alabama, all have their lands laid off in the parallelograms prescribed by the laws regulating United States surveys; but their people are not organized into self-governing communes."

"But was there no equivalent system of local self-government in those states?"

"No; and there is not to-day. In some cases there are lame approaches to it; but in none of the former slave States were the counties made up of self-governing subdivisions. The South is to-day and always has been a stranger to local self-government. In many of those states every justice of the peace, every school committeeman, every inspector of elections is appointed by some central power in the county, which is in turn itself appointed either by the Chief Executive of the State or by the dominant party in the Legislature. There may be the form of townships, but the differential characteristic is lacking—the self-governing element of the township."

"I don't know that I fully comprehend you," said Goodspeed. "Please illustrate."

"Well, take one state for an example, where the constitution adopted during the reconstruction period introduced the township system, and authorized the electors of each township to choose their justices of the peace, constables, school-cominitteemen, and other local officials. It permitted the people of the county to choose a board of commissioners, who should administer the financial matters of the county, and, in some instances, exeicise a limited judicial authority. But now they have, in effect, returned to the old system. The dominant party in the Legislature appoints every justice of the peace in the state. The justices of the peace of each county elect from their number the county commissioners; the county commissioners appoint the school-committeemen, the roadmasters, the registrars of election and the judges of election; so that every local interest throughout the entire state is placed under the immediate power and control of the dominant party, although not a tenth part of the voters of any particular township or county may belong to that party. In another state all this power, and even more, is exercised by the Chief Executive; and in all of them you will find that the county—or its equivalent, the parish—is the smallest political unit having a municipal character."