must be had to the laws of the several states.




Chapter XVI.

Incorporation and Government of Cities, Villages, &c.



§1. Cities and incorporated villages have governments peculiar to
themselves. Places containing a large and close population need a
different government from that of ordinary towns or townships. Many of
the laws regulating the affairs of towns thinly inhabited, are not
suited to a place where many thousand persons are closely settled.
Besides, the electors in such a place would be too numerous to meet in a
single assembly for the election of officers or the transaction of other
public business.

§2. Whenever, therefore, the inhabitants of any place become so numerous
as to require a city government, they petition the legislature for a law
incorporating them into a city. The law or act of incorporation is
usually called a _charter_. The word _charter_ is from the Latin
_charta_, which means paper. The instruments of writing by which kings
or other sovereign powers granted rights and privileges to individuals
or corporations, were written on paper or parchment, and called
_charters_. In this country, it is commonly used to designate an act of
the legislature conferring privileges and powers upon cities, villages,
and other corporations.