all. Each citizen present at such a meeting may join in the debate. From
the printed copy of the officers' reports he may learn what his town
government has done in the year past; from the printed warrant he may
see what is proposed to be done in the year coming. He who knows the
better way in any of the business is sure to receive a hearing. The
pockets of all being concerned, whatever is best and cheapest is
insured. Bribery, successful only in the dark, has little or no field in
the town meeting.

Provision usually exists by which a town may dispose of any urgent
matters springing up for legislation in the course of the year: as a
rule a special town meeting may be called on petition of a small number
of citizens, commonly seven to eleven.

In a study of the town meeting system of today, in "Harper's Monthly,"
June, 1891, Henry Loomis Nelson brought out many convincing facts as to
its superiority over government by a town board. Where the cost for
public lighting in a New England town had been but $2,000, in a New York
town of the same size it had amounted to $11,000. The cities of
Worcester, Mass., and Syracuse, New York, each of about 80,000
inhabitants, were compared, with the New England city in every respect
by far the more economically governed. Towns in New England are
uniformly superior to others in other parts of the country with regard
to the extent of sewers and paved streets. The aggregate of town debts
in New England is vastly less than the aggregate for a similar
population in the Middle States. The state constitutions of New England
commonly relate to fundamental principles, since each district may
protect itself by the town meeting; but outside New England, to assert
the rights of localities, state constitutions usually perforce embody
particulars. In their fire and police departments, and public school and