not only introducing but speaking upon measures in the legislative body
with which they are associated, without, however, having a vote. In
about half the cantons, the cantonal executive councils are elected by
the people; in the rest by the legislative body.

Types of the executive councils are those of Geneva, city and canton.
The city executive council is composed of five members, elected by the
people for four years. The salary of its president is $800 a year; that
of the other four members, $600. The cantonal executive has seven
members; the salaries are: the president, $1,200; the rest, $1,000. In
both city and cantonal councils each member is the head of an
administrative department. The cantonal executive council has the power
to suspend the deliberations of the city executive council and those of
the communal councils whenever in its judgment these bodies transcend
their legal powers or refuse to conform to the law. In case of such
suspension, a meeting of the cantonal Grand Council (the legislature)
must be called within a week, and if it approves of the action of the
cantonal executive, the council suspended is dissolved, and an election
for another must be had within a month, the members of the body
dissolved not being immediately eligible for re-election. The cantonal
executive council may also revoke the commissions of communal executives
(maires and adjoints), who then cannot immediately be re-elected. Check
to the extensive powers of the cantonal executive council lies in the
fact that its members are elected directly by the people and hold office
for only two years. But in cantons having the obligatory Referendum,
Geneva's methods, however advanced in the eyes of American republicans,
are not regarded as strictly democratic.


_The Federal Executive Council._