Elements of Civil Government / A Text-Book for Use in Public Schools, High Schools and Normal Schools and a Manual of Reference for Teachers

by Alexander L. Peterman

FORMATION.--In the Eastern States the townships were formed in the first settlement of the country, and afterward a number of townships were combined to form the county. In the Western States the townships were surveyed, and their boundaries marked, by agents of the general government, before the Territories became States of the Union. As a natural result, the townships of the Eastern States are irregular in shape and size, while those of the Western States have a regular form, each being about six miles square. In the Western States the township is usually composed of thirty-six sections, each section being one mile square, and containing six hundred and forty acres of land.

PURPOSES.--It is an old and true maxim that government should be brought as near the people as possible. This the township system does. In our country all power resides in the people, and the township provides a convenient means of ascertaining their wishes and of executing their will. The farther away the government, the less will be the people's power; the nearer the government, the greater will be the people's power. The township system enables each community to attend to its own local affairs--a work which no other agency can do so well--to remove readily and speedily its local public grievances, and to obtain readily and speedily its local public needs.

CITIZENS.

The citizens of the township are the people living in it, whether native or foreigners who have become citizens. It exists for their benefit, to afford them a means of securing their rights and of redressing their wrongs. It is these persons that the law has in view when setting forth the privileges and immunities of citizenship.

RIGHTS.--All citizens of the township arc entitled to enjoy the rights of "life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness." The township government exists for the purpose of securing these rights to the people. All have equal claims to the fullest protection of the law. They may use their own property as they choose, and do whatever pleases them, so long as they do not interfere with the rights of others. Whenever one's act, speech, or property interferes with the rights of others, he falls under the censure of the law and becomes subject to its penalty.

All male inhabitants born in the United States, and foreigners who have become citizens, who have resided within the State, county, and township the time required by law, are entitled to vote at all township, county, state, and national elections. Several States require ability to read, or the payment of poll-tax, as a qualification to vote; a few permit the subjects of foreign countries to vote; and in some States women are permitted to vote in school elections or in all elections. Lunatics, idiots, paupers, and persons convicted of certain high crimes are disfranchised; that is, are not permitted to vote. The right of suffrage is one of great power and value, being the basis of all free government, and is jealously guarded by the laws of the land.

DUTIES.--The people have extensive rights and they have equally extensive duties. Each citizen has rights that others must respect. It is the duty of each to observe and regard the rights of all other persons; and when he does not, the law interferes by its officers and deprives him of his own rights by fine or imprisonment, and in some instances by a still more severe penalty. It is the duty of the people to love and serve the country; to be good citizens; to labor for the public good; to obey the law, and to assist the officers in its enforcement.

It is the duty of the qualified voters to give the township good government by electing good officers. A vote cast for a bad man or a bad measure is an attack upon the rights of every person in the community. The power of suffrage is held for the public good; but it is used for the public injury when incompetent or unfaithful men are elected to office. Good government and the happiness and prosperity of the country depend upon an honest and intelligent vote.

GOVERNMENT.

The township government possesses legislative, judicial, and executive functions. It has a legislative department to make local laws, a judicial department to apply the laws to particular cases, and an executive department to enforce these and other laws. The three functions are of nearly equal prominence in the Eastern States, but in the West the executive function is more prominent than the legislative and the judicial.