The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1915-03-26
For Tax Assessor.
The County Court.

HIS paper AdUS SuIuc IS1StSAlN
last week to the draft of bill pub
lished in the city papers, the pun
pose of which is to change the forT
of county government, the legisla
tive part of it, to the commission
system. That is ii does not abolisi
the office of district magistrates, bu
transfers all the legislative an.
elective functions of the court 10
commission of three men, This bill
was very uneeremoniously dedicated
to the waste basket by the oour
last Saturday, in straw vote made
to test the strength of the Court 8:
to the bill
Mr.. John White, the statesman
from Number Five, declared that the
bill was not Democratic. Now the
commission form Of government is
one OF President Wilson's Democrat
ic reforms If il Is not Democratic
then M. Wilson, who is the author
Of many Democratic reforms in New
Jersey and in the United States. has
departed from the faith.
The Commercial cherishes no an
tipa1hy whatever for one system
more than another. and does not
take 10 the theory that system alone
is responsible for all the good or
evil of any county or municipal or
ganization. The County Court at
present costs the county something
like $4,000 a year for it's services,
including the Judges salary. The
bill proposes an expenditure of $4,-
500 for its commissioners in salaries
But the idea in the change is to
devote more time to the work of the
court, to eliminate useless expendi-
ture and to convert the excess of
this expenditure to well defined
channels for the betterment of the
roads and schools and internal i'm
provements of the county. The
court devotes eight days in the year
to this work, and it cannot possibly
do it as well, makes no difference
how capable it's members, as body
of men giving their whole time to
the work. That is a foregone con-
clusion. Some of the work is bound
to be imperfect because not duly
considered and conducted, and some
money is for the same reason bound
to slip through the fingers that is
not judiciously directed.
No personal charges can be made
against anyone for inefficiency. If
your business or mine had attention
only eight days in the year we
would soon have no business. The
business of the county is greater
than the business of great ma
jority of our citizens, any
single one of them. 1t in
wolves appropriations approx
mating $150,000 a year. The State
tax, of course, is fixed, but the bal
ance is fixed by the County Court.
1t needs more time than eight days
in the year, and men should be
elected who are responsible to give
their full time to the work
We have no preconceived convic-
tions for a commission government
On numbers of occasions this paper
has advised that the court should
divide itself into stated committees,
like nearly all other capably organ
lied bodies in the world for the
transaction of business. These COM
mittees should meet and give ample
time to all proposed legislation,
either appropriations or otherwise, |
and they should have reasonable
pay for such time The lack of any |
well defined system for this work, !
and not the County Court as a leg
islative body alone, is responsible |
for the suggestion of a change. This
suggestion in many places has de-
veloped into a demand for the
change, and the commission system
is therefore becoming very popular
in many counties and municipalities
in various States. No demand for
change has been made in our own
city system, because, as we have
stated, it has committee subdivis-
ions to whom can be and is referred
stated functions of the general
work, and special committees are al
so commissioned for special work.
Last week we called attention to
the fact that no appreciate progress
had been made in our road and
school system in Obion County in
the ninety years of its organization.
We believe this is borne out by the !