# Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania 1874/Article 14

This edition is taken from the Pennsylvania Constitution Webpage at Duquesne University School of Law.

## Article XIV: County Officers
### Section 1: County officers.

County officers shall consist of sheriffs, coroners, prothonotaries, register of wills, recorders of deeds, commissioners, treasurers, surveyors, auditors or controllers, clerks of the courts, district attorneys and such others as may be from time to time be established by law; and no sheriff or treasurer shall be eligible for the term next succeeding the one for which he may be elected.
Amendment of November 6, 1945

### Section 2: Election and tenure. Vacancies.

County officers shall be elected at the general elections and shall hold their offices for the term of three years, beginning on the first Monday of January next after their election, and until their successors shall be duly qualified; all vacancies not otherwise provided for, shall be filled in such manner as may be provided by law.
Amendment of November 2, 1909

### Section 3: Residence of county officers.

No person shall be appointed to any office within any county who shall not have been a citizen and an inhabitant therein one year next before his appointment, if the county shall have been so long erected, but if it shall not have been so long erected, then within the limits of the county or counties out of which it shall have been taken.

### Section 4: Offices to be kept to county town.

Prothonotaries, clerks of the courts, recorders of deeds, register of wills, county surveyors and sheriffs, shall keep their offices in the county town of the county in which they respectively shall be officers.

### Section 5: Compensation.

The compensation of county officers shall be regulated by law, and all county officers who are or who may be salaried shall pay all fees which they may be authorized to receive, into the treasury of the county or State, as may be directed by law. In counties containing over one hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants all county officers shall be paid by salary, and the salary of any such officer and his clerks, heretofore paid by fees, shall not exceed the aggregate amount of fees earned during his term and collected by and for him.

### Section 6: Accountability of municipal officers.

The General Assembly shall provide by law for the strict accountability of all county, township and borough officers, as well for the fees which may be collected by them, as for all public or municipal moneys which may be paid to them.

### Section 7: County commissioners and auditors to be chosen by limited vote. Vacancies--how filled.

Three county commissioners and three county auditors shall be elected in each county where such officers are chosen, in the year one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five and every third year thereafter; and in the election of said officers each qualified elector shall vote for no more than two persons, and the three persons having the highest number of votes shall be elected; any casual vacancy in the office of county commissioner or county auditor shall be filled by the court of common pleas of the county in which such vacancy shall occur, by the appointment of an elector of the proper county who shall have voted for the commissioner or auditor whose place is to be filled.
Amendment of November 2, 1909

### Section 8

Added by amendment of November 6, 1951