ceeding 100%. in the case of mayor, or 50%. in the case of alderman or councillor, as may be determined by a bye-law of the council. Or if he do not make and subscribe the required declaration within five days after his election, he will be liable to pay the same fine, and a new election is to take place. Every person above sixty-five years of age, or who has served the office, or paid a fine for not serving, within five years previously, is to be exempted from serving if he claim exemption within five days after notice of his election. Military, naval, and marine officers on full pay, and persons employed and residing in any of his Majesty's dock-yards, victualling establishments, arsenals, or barracks, are not to be compelled to accept office. Councillors.-The election of councillors is to take place on the 1st of November in every year. Every burgess enrolled at the time of the election, and such only, will be entitled to vote. At any election the mayor, if he shall deem it expedient for the purpose of taking the poll, may cause booths to be erected or rooms to be hired for different parts of the borough. He is to appoint a poll-clerk at each booth or compartment of a booth, and is to cause to be fixed conspicuously on the booths the names of the parts for which they are respectively allotted. It is expressly provided that henceforth no municipal election (as in the Parliamentary Reform Act it was provided respecting parliamentary elections) shall be held in any church, chapel, or place of public worship. Every election of councillors must be held before the mayor for the time being and the assessors, acting by deputy in the different booths, except in boroughs divided into wards. In the latter case the first election after such division is to be held before the mayor, or the person whom he shall appoint in each ward; and in each succeeding year the election in each ward is to be held before the alderman whom the councillors of that ward shall yearly appoint for that purpose, and before the two assessors of that ward, in the same manner as the elections for undivided boroughs are to be held before the mayor and assessors. The mayor and assessors are to examine the votingpapers delivered in by the electors; and in case of an equality in the number of votes for any two or more persons, the mayor and assessors, or any two of them, are to name from among those having the equal number of votes one or more, as may be necessary to make up the number requisite to be chosen. The mayor is to cause the voting paper to be kept in the town-clerk's office for six calendar months at least after each election; and the town-clerk is to permit any burgess to inspect the voting papers of any year on payment of 18. for each search. If at the time when an election must take place the mayor should be dead, absent, or otherwise incapable of acting, the council is forthwith to elect one of the aldermen to execute these powers and duties in place of the mayor. In the first election (1835) of councillors, assessors, and auditors, the mayor alone is to act in the same manner in which it is provided that the mayor and assessors shall do jointly in succeeding elections. Aldermen. After the first year (1835), the council of each borough for the time being are to elect one half of the total number of aldermen on the 9th of November in every third year. Any extraordinary vacancy is to be filled up by the council electing some qualified person, within ten days after its occurrence, on a day to be fixed by the mayor. | And in case any councillor shall be elected alderman, then the vacancy thus created in the council is to be supplied in the manner above described. But after the full number of councillors regularly elected in any year shall have declared their acceptance of office, no new election is to take place on account of an extraordinary vacancy alone, unless by it the remaining number of councillors is reduced to two-thirds or less of the whole number for the borough. Every person chosen alderman to supply a vacancy, is to hold office until his predecessor would regularly have gone out. Mayor. The mayor is to be elected by the council. The first election being postponed by Order in Council to the 1st of January, 1836; future elections are to take place yearly on the 9th of November, commencing with the November of the same year. In case of a vacancy occurring during the year of office by non-acceptance, death, or resig nation, the council are to elect another qualified person within ten days, to hold office for the remainder of the current year. For the prevention of bribery at municipal elections, a penalty of 50%. is enacted against the party either taking or offering a bribe, to be recovered, with full costs, by any one who will sue for it in any of his majesty's courts of record at Westminster. Powers of the Council, and Regulation of its Meetings.The appointing of officers, the enacting of local regulations, and the levying of local taxes, are distinctly recognized by the Act as the three principal powers to be exercised by the local legislature. The council are to appoint the town-clerk, the treasurer, and such other officers as have been yearly appointed for the borough, or as they shall think necessary for the execution of the powers and duties vested in them by this Act, and may discontinue such appointments as in their opinion may cease to be necessary; they may take such security as they think proper from each, and are to direct such allowances to be paid to the mayor, town-clerk, treasurer, and other officers, as they shall think reasonable. They are empowered to remove any ministerial officer of the corporation who may be in office at the date of the first election of councillors under this Act, and to fix the compensation to be paid to such officer, subject to appeal to the Lords of the Treasury. ་ They are also empowered to make bye-laws for the good rule and government of the borough, and for prevention and suppression of all such nuisances as are not already punishable in a summary manner by virtue of any act in force throughout such borough,' and to appoint fines for such offences, not exceeding 51. But all bye-laws must be made by two-thirds of the council at least, and are not to take effect until forty days after a copy shall have been sent, sealed with the borough seal, to one of the principal secretaries of state, and have been fixed up in some public place in the borough-within which period the king in council may disallow any such by-law wholly or in part, or fix some later day for its coming into force. The council are further empowered to levy a borough-rate and a watch-rate, to appoint a watch-committee, and to demise and lease the borough lands, tenements, &c. under certain restrictions. All acts done by the council, and all questions brought before them, are to be decided by a majority of the members present; but the whole number present must not be less than one-third of the whole number of the council. The mayor, if present, is to preside; or, in his absence, such alderman, or in the absence of all the aldermen, such councillor, as the assembled council shall choose for chairman of that meeting; and the chairman is to have the casting vote. Minutes of the proceedings of all such meetings are to be kept, signed by the presiding member, and to be open to the inspection of any burgess, on payment of one shilling. In every instance a summons, signed by the townclerk, stating the business of the meeting, is to be left at the residence or premises of every member of the council three days before the meeting, and no business is to be transacted at such meeting but that specified in the notice. There must be four quarterly meetings of the council in every year for the transaction of general business, of which no notice need be given. Mayor, as un executive head of the borough under the new Act.-The mayor has already been spoken of as the president of the borough legislature. In this place we may mention that precedence within the borough is distinctly assigned him in the Act; and that, in accordance with all previous usage, he is to be returning officer in all parlia mentary boroughs, excepting those cities and towns which, being counties of themselves, have sheriffs of their own. And if from any cause, in any borough wherein the mayor is returning officer, there be no mayor at the time of a parliamentary election, the council are to elect one of the alder men to be returning officer. And in any case in which there shall be more than one mayor within the limits of a parliamentary borough, the mayor of that municipal borough to which the writ of election is directed is to be the returning officer. A new class of officers, under the name of assessors, is created by the Act. to assist in each borough, and in each ward in boroughs divided into wards, in revising the burgess lists, and presiding at municipal elections. Of these officers there are to be two in boroughs not divided into wards, and two for each ward in boroughs which are so divided. They are to be annually elected by the burgesses at large; and their pecuniary qualification must be the same in every respect as that of councillors. Every person must accept office when elected; and must make and subscribe the declaration of acceptance and qualification within five days, as required in the case of inayor, alderman, and councillor. The office of the assessors is, to revise the burgess-lists in conjunction with the mayor, at the annual courts to be held for that purpose; to be present with the mayor or an alderman, in the respective boroughs or wards, at each annual election of councillors, auditors, and of those who are to succeed them in the office of assessor; and to ascertain and declare the result of such elections. 3. Ministerial Officers; their Appointment, Designation, and Functions. The chief ministerial officers of a borough, as hitherto constituted, have been the public secretary and general adviser of the corporation, called most frequently the townclerk, though sometimes the common-clerk; and the treasurer, or depositary of the public revenue and keeper of the public accounts, commonly styled chamberlain. Both these officers have been appointed during good behaviour, usually by the common council; the former sometimes, and the latter in a great majority of instances, out of their own body. In a few places, the town-clerk was named by the recorder, and occasionally he was nominated or approved by the crown. In some towns he was elected yearly by the freemen from themselves; and in most, it was necessary that he should be a freeman. He was generally required to reside in the borough, and usually was an attorney. He had generally a salary, which however in most cases was little more than nominal; the real inducement for holding the situation being the legal business, for which he was paid according to the usual scale of professional charges, or the introduction to private practice through his connexion with the members of the corporation. that principle had been applied to the very important office The council are directed to appoint every year a fit person to be treasurer; he is to give such security as the council may require. He must not be the town-clerk of the borough, nor a member of the council, nor will he be eligible as The chamberlain's duties have been, to receive the reve- auditor or assessor. His salary is to be determined by the nues, make the requisite payments to the order of the com- council, who may fill up any vacancy by a fresh appointpetent authorities, keep the accounts, and superintend the ment. He is to keep true accounts, entered in books kept corporation property. In some instances the head of the for that purpose, of all sums received and paid by him, and corporation acted as treasurer; in which case, as in every of the several matters for which such sums shall have been other in which the chamberlain was a member of the com-received and paid; and the books containing the accounts mon council, he commonly belonged to the body by which are to be open at all reasonable times to the inspection of his accounts were audited. But in some large towns, as any of the aldermen or councillors of the borough. And he London, Bath, and Bristol, this has never been the case. is to submit all the accounts, with all vouchers and papers The chamberlain has been sometimes paid by a poundage thereto relating, to the auditors twice in every year; and on the income collected by him, but more frequently by a after they have been examined and audited by the auditors salary, and by the profit of balances left in his hands: in in the month of September in every year, he is to make out corporations where his receipts were considerable, he was in writing, and cause to be printed, a full abstract of his often required to give security. accounts for the year; a copy of which is to be open to the inspection of all the rate-payers of the borough, and copies are to be delivered to all rate-payers applying for them, on payment of a reasonable price for each copy. Inferior officers were found, more or less numerous, in all the corporate cities and towns. These were either officers of ceremony, as sword-bearers, mace-bearers, &c.,-of police, as constables, serjeants at mace, or town-serjeants,-and others, as beadles, criers, &c., whose functions are sufficiently indicated by their appellations. They were nearly always freemen under the control of the governing body. Many of them had neither duties, fees, nor salaries; yet they were yearly elected and solemnly sworn to the fulfilment of their nominal functions, the corporations doubting whether they could legally cease to elect any officers named in their charters. The common council of London however has assumed the authority of abolishing some useless offices, consolidating others, and attaching to them new and useful functions. Defects in the old Constitution of the Ministerial Offices. 'One vice,' say the commissioners, which we regard as inherent in the constitution of municipal corporations in England and Wales is, that officers chosen for particular functions are regarded as a necessary part of the legislative body. This notion appears to have originated in times when the separation of constitutional authorities was not understood; when legislative, judicial, and executive functions were confounded. . . There are serious objections to the practice of allowing the mayor to act as the treasurer of the corporation, when the examination and audit of his accounts is placed in the body over which he presides. Inconvenience of an opposite kind occurs where several persons are required to concur in executing the duties of a single office.* The extent to which some corporations carried the principle of treating the corporate offices as matter of mere patronage, is illustrated in the commissioners' general report, by two instances where, in two considerable towns, The police belonging to municipal corporations, under the old system, was for the most part very insufficient. In a great number of towns there were no watchmen, nor policeofficers of any kind, except the constables, who were unsalaried officers, appointed sometimes at a court leet, but more frequently by the corporate authorities. Where there were fairs and markets held within the borough limits, the municipal corporation had in most cases the superintendence and management of them, as incident both to its property and to its general municipal authority. Many of these had courts of pie-poudre, which were disused in the majority of instances. Already we have remarked the general resort which has been had to local Acts of Parliament to supply the serious deficiencies of the old municipal regulations; and that the superintendence of the police, and the powers necessary for watching, paving, lighting, cleansing, and supplying the towns with water, were for the most part committed, in each town, under these acts, to one or more bodies of commissioners, independent of the municipal corporation. Sometimes, indeed, these powers were shared between the corporate authorities and the commissioners; and often many of the corporate functionaries were named in these acts as commissioners, by virtue of their corporate offices. But much confusion resulted from this divided authority. In several towns, owing to the general distrust of the corporate authorities, the inhabitants showed little alacrity to avail themselves of the provisions of these local acts. Great jealousy often subsisted between the officers of police acting under the corporation, and those under the local commissioners: and the corporate body seldom took any active share in the duties of the board of which its members formed a part. At Bristol (one of the principal towns of which the corporations, after the Revolution, clung to the new governing charter imposed by Charles II.) a notoriously ineffective police could not be improved, chiefly through the jealousy with which the corporation was regarded by the inhabitants. At Hull, owing to the disunion between the governing body and the inhabitants, arising chiefly out of a dispute about the tolls and duties, only seven persons attended to suppress a riot, out of a thousand who had been sworn in as special constables; and on another similar occasion none whatever attended. At Coventry serious riots and disturbances frequently occurred; and the officers of police, being usually chosen from one political party, often actively fomented them. In some instances the separate and conflicting authority of the commissioners was avowedly used to counterbalance the political influence of the corporation. An ineffectual endeavour to obviate the evils resulting from the want of a well-organized system has been made in some towns by subscriptions for private watchmen. Nor has the superintendence of the paving, lighting, &c., of the various corporate towns been hitherto in a more satisfactory state. For the police of the reformed municipalities, the Act of 1835 makes, among others, the following uniform provisions : The council, immediately after their first election, and from time to time, are to appoint, for such time as they may think proper, a watch committee, consisting of the mayor and a sufficient number of councillors, of whom three are to be a quorum. Within three weeks after their first appointment, and from time to time, this committee are to appoint, and cause to be sworn in before a justice having jurisdiction within the borough, a sufficient number of fit men to act as constables by day and night, for preserving the peace, preventing felonies, and apprehending offenders. The constables are to have the usual powers, privileges, duties, and responsibilities, not only within the borough, but also in the county in which the borough or part of it is situated; every county that is within seven miles of any part of the borough, and all liberties within such county; and are to obey all lawful commands of any justice of the peace having jurisdiction in such borough or county. allowances, and the number and situation of all stationhouses in the borough; as also a copy of all rules, orders, &c., made from time to time for the regulation of the constables or policemen. With a view to the merging in the general authority of the municipal council of the powers vested in so many of the boroughs, by the local acts of which we have already spoken, in the hands of independent boards of commissioners, it is provided that the trustees appointed by virtue of any Act of Parliament, for paving, lighting, cleansing, watching, regulating, supplying with water, or improving any borough or part thereof, wherein they or the persons whose trustees they may be are not beneficially interested, may, at a meeting called for that purpose, transfer, in writing under their hands and seals, all the powers so vested in them by any such act, to the body corporate of such borough, who shall thenceforth be trustee for executing, by the council of the borough, the several powers and provisions of such act; and the members of the council are in that case to have the same powers and be subject to the same duties as if their names had been originally inserted in the act, or they had been elected under its provisions. A list of boroughs, and of the Acts of Parliament for the abovenamed purposes, the powers and duties under which the trustees are by this section of this act empowered to transfer to the council of such boroughs, is given in schedule (E) appended to the act; but it is provided that no such transfer shall be made of powers under the acts therein mentioned, relating to the town of Cambridge, without the consent of the chancellor, master, and scholars of the university there. With respect to lighting, it is further provided that the council of any borough having a local act for lighting part thereof only, may make an order to include any other part within its provisions after a certain day named. And after such day it is to be so included, so far as relates to lighting or to any rates authorized to be levied for that purpose. And every such part is to be lighted like the other parts of the borough, and to pay for that purpose a rate not exceeding the average expense in the pound of the lighting of those other parts. If the council of any borough shall, by notice fixed in a public place within the borough, declare that on a certain day named (not within twenty-one days), they will take upon themselves the powers given to inspectors named in the Act of 3 & 4 William IV. cap. 90, so far as it relates to lighting the whole or any part of a borough not within the provisions of any local act, or in which there is no power of levying rates for lighting, the council of such borough are to have, after the day named, the same powers and duties as the inspectors under the last-mentioned act, for lighting and levying rates for that purpose, so far as they are consistent with the provisions of this act. And the council alone are to fix the sum to be called for in pence in the pound on the annual value of the rateable property therein; and in such case, the inhabitants of such part of the borough are not to have power to decide that the provisions of the above-named act shall cease to be acted upon. The treasurer of the borough is to pay such wages and allowances as the watch committee, subject to the approba-any year for lighting such part, which must not exceed sixtion of the council, shall direct to be paid to the constables; and also such sums as they may award, subject to the same approbation, as a reward for extraordinary diligence and exertion, or as a compensation for wounds and injuries received in the performance of duty, or as an allowance to those that may be disabled or worn out by length of service; and any other expenses for the constabulary force, so directed and approved; also any extraordinary expenses necessarily incurred in apprehending offenders and executing any orders of any justice of the peace for the borough, ordered by the council to be paid, such expenses having been first approved by the justices. Two or more justices having jurisdiction within any borough are, in the month of October in every year, to appoint, under their hands, so many inhabitants (not legally exempt) as they shall think fit, to act as special constables when required by a justice's warrant, reciting that in the opinion of the justice granting it the ordinary police force is insufficient at that time to maintain the peace. And every person appointed a special constable is to take the oath set forth in the Act of 1 & 2 Will. IV. cap. 41, and to have the powers and immunities, and be liable to the duties and penalties therein enacted; and is to receive out of the borough fund 3s. 6d. for each day during which he is called out to act. The watch committee, on the 1st of January, April, July, and October, in every year, are to transmit to one of the secretaries of state a report of the number of constables or policemen, the description of arms, accoutrements, clothing, and necessaries, furnished to each man, their wages and 2. Management of Corporate Property and Revenues. Many of the old corporations had considerable revenues derived from various sources; from lands, leases of tithes, and other property; from tolls of markets and fairs; from tolls or duties on the import or export of goods and merchandise, commonly called town dues; from other duties, as quay dues, anchorage, &c.; and from fees payable on the admission of corporate officers and burgesses, as well as from fines imposed on persons refusing municipal office. In many corporations the revenue was sufficient for the maintenance of all necessary municipal institutions; but in these they were often but partially applied to really municipal purposes. In most, however, the commissioners declare that they would have been inadequate to these purposes, even though they had been wholly expended upon them. There were many instances among the parliamentary boroughs in which, the revenues being inadequate to the wants of the municipality, the deficiency had been supplied either by the political patron or by the members for the borough. In some, before the passing of the Parliamentary Reform Act of 1832, the members or the patron paid all the municipal expenses; and these contributions having ceased since that time, such corporations have no longer had the means of maintaining municipal institutions of any kind. the treasurer of the borough, and to be carried by him to the account of a fund to be called the borough fund.' In numerous instances, too, individual corporators were ac- | customed to receive pecuniary allowances from the patron; which sources of emolument having likewise ceased in great measure since the passing of the Reform Act, a principal inducement to belong to the corporate body has been thereby in many places taken away. Both the income derived from market and fair tolls, and that from town dues, have been subjects of general complaint, grounded as well on the consideration that the money thus levied has seldom been applied for the good of the community, as on the vexatious and injurious nature of that kind of taxation-arising, in some places, from the exorbitancy of the tax-in others, as at Bristol, from its tendency to limit the trade of the port; besides that, whatever may have been the origin of these tolls, in latter times they have been paid, in many instances, without any equivalent being rendered by the corporations which have enforced them. The income arising from fines levied on persons refusing to serve corporate offices has also been a source of reasonable complaint, where such fines have been levied, not really for the purpose-of compelling individuals to serve, but for the sake of increasing the funds of the corporation. This fund, subject to the payment of all lawful debts due from the late body corporate contracted before the passing of this act, with all interest accruing while any part shall remain unredeemed, and saving all rights or claims in or upon the real or personal estate of such body corporate by virtue of any proceedings in law or equity, or of any mortgage or otherwise, is to be applied towards the payment of the salary of the mayor, and of the recorder and the policemagistrate (where the latter functionaries shall be created), the salaries of the town-clerk, treasurer, and every other officer appointed by the council; as also towards the payment of the expenses incurred from time to time in preparing burgess lists, ward lists, and notices, and in other matters connected with the borough elections, and for other necessary and useful purposes mentioned in the act. The council are not permitted to sell, mortgage, or alienate any part of the borough lands, tenements, or hereditaments; and leases granted by them are to be for a term not exceeding thirty-one years from the date of the lease, or of a previous agreement, should there be one; and leases are to be at a clear yearly rent, without any fine: except the yearly value of the property shall arise principally from buildings, or the property shall consist of land for the erection of buildings, on which the lessee shall covenant to erect buildings of greater yearly value than the land, or for laying out gardens, yards, or other appurtenances to buildings, which case the lease may be for any term not exceeding seventy-five years. The most glaring evils have resulted from mismanagement of the corporate property. Some corporations have been accustomed to let their lands by private contract to members of their own body, on rents and at fines wholly disproportioned to their value, and frequently for long terms of years. Others have alienated in fee much of their property for inadequate considerations. In large towns how-in ever the prevalent species of malversation has been, not so much the clandestine appropriation of the corporate property, as carelessness and extravagance in the administration of the municipal funds, and an exclusive distribution of patronage among friends and partisans. In some towns large sums have been spent in bribery and other illegal practices at contested parliamentary elections. The corporation of Leicester, for instance, in 1826, expended 10,000l. to secure the return of a political partisan, and mortgaged some of their property to discharge the liabilities thus incurred. At Barnstaple and Liverpool, in like manner, the funds of the corporation have been wasted in defending from threatened disfranchisement a body of freemen who had been proved guilty of bribery. In general, the corporate funds have been only partially applied to municipal purposes, as the providing an efficient police, the watching and lighting the town, &c., but have frequently been expended in feasting and in paying the salaries of unimportant offices. The allowance to the head of the corporation was often very large; and it was well understood that he was to spend it in public entertainments. The practice of having periodical dinners, &c. for the members of the common council and their friends, the cost of which was defrayed out of the corporate funds, was almost universal, and in some places consumed a large portion of the revenues. The commissioners found the debt of many corporations to be extremely heavy, owing often to negligent and improper management. In some, the payment of the interest absorbed a very large proportion of the income; others were absolutely insolvent. Many of the close corporations had become indebted to the patron of the borough for sums of money advanced to them for municipal and other purposes. Some check might have been imposed on these various abuses by the force of public opinion, had the corporate accounts been regularly kept and regularly subjected to public inspection: but so irregularly had they been kept, that in the course of the late municipal inquiry, the facts relative to the amount and management of corporate property, the expenditure, and the debts, were in many places elicited with difficulty and imperfectly. In some places no accounts at all were kept; in others they were kept very incompletely; in very few was there any regular and efficient audit, and in still fewer any publication of them. The new Act will be found to provide efficient remedies for these defects in the financial department of municipal government. After the election of the treasurer, the rents and profits of all hereditaments. and the interest, dividends, and annual proceeds of all monies, dues, chattels, and valuable securities belonging to the former body corporate of such borough, named in the schedules (A) and (B), or to any member or officer thereof in his corporate capacity, and every fine and penalty for any offence against this act, the application of which is not otherwise therein provided for, is to be paid to In special cases the council may sell, or alienate, or demise, or lease for a longer term than thirty-one years, by representing the circumstances to the Lords of the Treasury, and obtaining their approbation of the act, and of the terms and conditions; but in such case the council must give one month's notice, fixed in some public place in the borough, of their intended application, and a copy of the memorial to be sent to the Lords of the Treasury must lie during that period in the town-clerk's office, open to the inspection of every burgess. Not only the regular keeping and the publicity of accounts, but that important article in the financial department of borough government, the regular and responsible auditing of them, are now first uniformly and effectively provided for. Two auditors are to be elected for each borough or ward by the burgesses, in precisely the same manner as already described in the case of assessors. Twice in every year they are to examine and audit the treasurer's accounts, in conjunction with a member of the council to be named by the mayor. 3. Local Taxation. Municipal taxation under the old system was as irregular as all its other financial arrangements. The almost universal persuasion on the part of the members of corporations, that the permanent income derived from rents, tolls, dues, &c., was of right applicable to the sole benefit of the corporators themselves, and the consequent unprofitable expenditure of that income, called the powers of local taxation, where the corporation possessed them, into additional activity, though generally with no equivalent advantage to the inhabitants. The introduction, too, in so many places, of local acts of parliament for the realization of objects of public utility, which, according to their nature, should have fallen strictly within the province of municipal administration, must often have brought them, in the levying of local rates, into an actual or seeming collision with the boards of commissioners appointed under those acts. In some boroughs the corporation levied on the inhabitants a rate in the nature of a county-rate, and destined to similar objects. The Municipal Reform Act, as we have already observed, opens the way for transferring the powers of the local boards to the municipal councils, and so introducing one general and uniform system of municipal taxation. After providing, as above described, for the faithful appropriation of the standing revenue of the borough to public objects, it proceeds to direct how such additional funds are to be raised as may be necessary to defray the charges of those arrangements for the public convenience and security of which it ensures the execution. 4. Specific Trusts and Patronage. Besides the property applicable to all municipal purposes, various funds and revenues have at different times been entrusted to corporations for specific objects. Tolls and dues, for instance, have been granted for some purpose of local utility, as the maintenance of a navigation or a harbour, and granted for such purpose exclusively. Financial abuses, of the same nature as those which we have already noticed, have appeared in the management and application of those funds. Other special trusts are connected with charitable institutions and the administration of charity funds; and here again we find mismanagement and misappropriation to a considerable extent: the patronage connected with these trusts has very often been exercised by the corporate authorities to gain or reward votes both in the municipal and the parliamentary elections. In many instances, too, the corporations have possessed ecclesiastical patronage, presenting to livings, and appointing lecturers; as well as the masters of hospitals and endowed schools. The new body corporate of any borough named in the schedules to the Municipal Reform Act are to be trustees for executing, through the council, the provisions of all Aets of Parliament made before the passing of this Act, and of all trusts (except under Acts of Parliament or for charitable purposes) of which the former body corporate, or any of its members as such, were sole trustees. In like manner, wherever the former body corporate, or any of its members as such, or any particular number of persons appointed by it, were trustees jointly with others, under any Act of Parliament or trust, or were, by any statute, charter, by-law, or custom, lawfully exercising any powers or functions not otherwise provided for by this Act,-provision is made for the transferring of such joint trusteeship to so many members of the new municipal council, appointed by the council at large, as shall be equal in number to the members or nominees of the former corporate body acting as such trustees or exercising such functions. As regards charitable trusts, it is deemed expedient that their administration should be kept distinct from that of the public funds of the municipality: therefore, wherever the former body corporate, or any of its members as such, stood solely, or together with other persons elected solely by them, in the exercise of any trust of this nature, it is, under the Act, to continue in the hands of the same individuals (notwithstanding that they may have ceased to hold any office by virtue of which they were such trustees) until the 1st of August, 1836; when, if Parliament shall not in the mean time have otherwise directed, the Lord Chancellor, or Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal, are to make such orders as he or they shall deem fit for the administration of such charitable trust estates. magistrate also of the neighbouring county. In many of the large cities and boroughs all the aldermen were magistrates; in others only those who had passed the chair, that is, who had served the executive office. At Norwich, the aldermen who had not passed the chair were magistrates in their several wards. In other towns only a certain number of the aldermen were elected magistrates yearly; in many, only the senior aldermen were magistrates: in Doncaster, three aldermen were chosen to be magistrates as long as they continued aldermen: in Ripon, the two aldermen who had last been mayors were magistrates: in Richmond, the last mayor only was so constituted. The judicial officer styled Recorder was also usually one of the justices. The chief amount of magisterial business was done by the mayor: in some corporations his magisterial authority continued for a year, or a longer time beyond the period of his mayoralty, either by the terms of the charter or by a customary election. Defects, &c.-The magistrates were usually chosen from the aldermen, and the aldermen were generally political partizans. Hence, even in those cases where injustice was not absolutely committed, a strong suspicion of it was excited; so that the corporate magistrates generally were not regarded by the inhabitants with favour or respect, but often with positive distrust and dislike. In many places there were heavy complaints of their non-residence. Magistracy under the Municipal Reform Act.-Among the municipal officers, the mayor alone is to be a justice of the peace by virtue of his office, in every borough, not only during his year of office, but during the whole of the year next following, if he continue to be pecuniarily qualified. But an important change is worked by the Act in the constitution of the borough-magistracy in general. The executive officer of each borough will henceforth be its only elective magistrate. Wherever there is to be a body of justices in addition, and wherever there are to be one or more police-magistrates, they are to be appointed by absolute nomination of the Crown. It is to be lawful for his Majesty from time to time to assign a commission to act as justices of the peace in and for each borough and city named in the schedule (A); and to assign one likewise, upon petition of the council, to any of the boroughs in the schedule (B); every such justice to reside in, or within seven miles of, the borough for which he acts. And if the council of any borough think it requisite to have one or more salaried police-magistrates, they are to make a by-law fixing the salary, and to transmit it to one of the Secretaries of State; and his Majesty, if he think fit, will appoint one or more persons, as required, barristersat-law of five years' standing, to be, during his pleasure, police-magistrates and justices of the peace; and will direct the payment of a salary to each, not exceeding the amount fixed by the council, through the treasurer of the borough, out of the borough fund, in four quarterly payments. When any vacancy occurs, a new application, as before, must be The anticipated influx of dissenters into the new municipal councils rendered the ecclesiastical patronage of the corporations a subject of grave debate in the discussions on the measure of municipal reform. The difficulty has been obviated thus. Where any former body corporate, or any number of its members as such, possessed any property (otherwise than as charitable trustees) to which any advowson or right of pre-made by the council. sentation or nomination to a benefice or ecclesiastical preferment was attached, or possessed any advowson in gross, or any right so to present or nominate, every such advowson, and right of presentation or nomination, is to be sold under the direction of the ecclesiastical commissioners, so that the best price may be obtained. The council are accordingly authorized to convey such right to the purchaser under the common seal of the borough; and the proceeds of the sale are to be paid to the treasurer, to be invested in government securities for the use of the new body corporate, and the annual interest is to be carried to the account of the borough fund. Any vacancy occurring before the effecting of such sale is directed to be filled up by the bishop of the diocese in which the preferment is situated. IV. ORGANIZATION FOR LOCAL JUDICATURE. Magistracy. In almost all the principal boroughs there were municipal magistrates whose authority as justices of the peace extended over the whole borough. In some cases the county magistrates exercised a concurrent jurisdiction within the borough; but more commonly that of the borough magistrates was exclusive; and even where the county magistrates possessed a concurrent jurisdiction within the municipal limits, they rarely exercised it. The head of the corporation has always been the chief municipal magistrate named in the charters; and in some few instances he has been, by virtue of his municipal office, a Recorder. Almost every English municipality had among its principal officers a recorder, sometimes called steward, who was always the principal judicial adviser of the corporation, and commonly exercised magisterial and judicial functions. He was elected in the majority of cases by the common-council; in many others, by the aldermen ; in some, by the freemen at large: occasionally his appointment was subject to approbation by the crown. By the terms of most of the charters he was required to be learned in the law. This condition was sometimes considered to be complied with by electing a peer of the realm, who, being a judge by the constitution of Parliament, was held to come within that technical description. Sometimes, however, recorders were chosen, notwithstanding such provision in the charter, who were neither peers nor educated to the legal profession: the office was sometimes filled by the individual who was commonly styled the patron of the borough: but in most of such cases, either there were no real functions to be exercised by the recorder, or he had the power of appointing a deputy, by whom most of his duties could be performed. The recorder generally held his office during good behaviour: he was seldom required to be resident in the borough. His deputy was sometimes a barrister; but in numerous instances the town-clerk practically offi ciated as such. The recorder's salary was in most cases nearly nominal, and in many had not been received for several years; in others the salary was large. |