in Georgia there was no executive council after 1789. True executive councils have now disappeared except in Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire.
§ 7. The names and duties of the other officers vary from state to state. In every state there are a secretary of state, who is custodian Administrative Offices in a State. of the documents and archives, and a treasurer. Nearly everywhere there are also a comptroller or auditor, who keeps the accounts and is the principal financial officer, an attorney-general or legal adviser, an adjutant-general, who has immediate charge of the militia, and a superintendent of public instruction, with some little authority over the public schools. Most of the states have also a board of charities, a board of health, a board of railway commissioners, and either boards or single commissioners for banking, insurance, agriculture, public lands and prisons. Other administrative departments found in different states are those having control of public works—principally canals—insane hospitals, factory inspection, labour statistics and immigration. New York state, with nearly fifty different administrative bureaus, has a larger number than any other state. In many states the most important of these officials are elected by the people at a general election, but some officials are either chosen by the legislature or appointed by the governor, the latter method applying mainly to offices of recent creation. The terms of office vary for the different offices, very few exceeding four years. The state officials, being thus largely independent of the governor, and responsible only to the people, are in no sense a cabinet (save in North Carolina). Each administers his own department, subject to the detailed regulation imposed by statutes, and as these statutes determine such matters as might come into controversy, a general agreement in policy among the administrative officials is not essential.
In many states officials may be removed, not only by impeachment, but also sometimes by vote of the legislature, sometimes by the governor on the address of both houses, or by the governor either alone or with the concurrence of the senate; but such removals must be made for specific misconduct.
The extent of direct state administration of public institutions and works is very limited, and most of the state bureaus have only a supervision over private enterprises, or over local administrative officers. On this account the subordinate civil service of the state is not large compared with that of either the Federal government or of the large municipalities, and only in a few states does it possess any importance. However, these bureaus are seldom well manned, because salaries and tenure of office are seldom such as to induce able men to offer themselves, while the places are often given as rewards for political service. New York, Massachusetts and a few other states have systems of civil service examinations, similar to those in the Federal administration, which serve to keep certain branches out of politics.
§ 8. The judiciary is in every state an independent department of the government, directly created by the state constitution, The State Judiciary. and not controlled in the exercise of its functions either by the legislature or by the executive. In every state it includes three sets of courts: a supreme court or court of appeal; superior courts of record; and local courts, but the particular names and relations of these several tribunals vary greatly from state to state. Most of the original thirteen colonies once possessed also separate courts of chancery; and these were maintained for many years after the separation from Great Britain, and were imitated in several of the earlier among the new states, but special chancery courts now exist only in a few of the states, chiefly in the East and South. In other states the common law judges have also equity jurisdiction; and in four states—New York, North Carolina, California and Idaho—there has been a complete fusion of law and equity.
In colonial days the superior judges were appointed by the governors, except in Rhode Island and Connecticut, where the legislatures elected them. These precedents were followed in all the revolutionary constitutions, except in Georgia, where election by the people was established. During the democratizing period from 1820 to 1860 the system of popular election was extended, especially in the new states, and at present this system prevails in thirty-six states, including practically all of the new states and five of the original states—New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, North Carolina and Georgia. Three of the original thirteen have their judges elected by the legislatures, and in five others, together with Maine and Mississippi among the newer states, they are appointed by the governor, subject to the approval of the executive council, the Senate, or (in Connecticut) the General Assembly. Local judges are generally chosen by the voters of the district in which they hold court.
Originally the superior judges were in most states appointed for life and held office during good behaviour, but only three states now retain this system. Eight to ten years is the average term of service; it is longer in New York (14), Maryland (15), and Pennsylvania (21), where alone superior judges are not re-eligible. Salaries, too, are small in most states, often not more than one-tenth of what a prominent lawyer can make by private practice.
These three factors—popular election, limited terms and small salaries—have all tended to lower the character of the judiciary; and in not a few states the state judges are men of moderate abilities and limited learning, inferior (and sometimes conspicuously inferior) to the best of the men who practise before them. Nevertheless, in most states the bench is respectable in point of character, while in some it is occasionally adorned by men of the highest eminence. The changes introduced since 1870 have been, on the whole, for the better, though there is still room for further improvement. Corruption seems to be very rare, but instances of subservience to powerful political groups sometimes shake public confidence. Things would doubtless have become worse but for the watchfulness which the bar generally shows in endeavouring to secure the selection of honest and fairly competent men. The administration of civil justice is decidedly better than that of criminal justice. The latter is in many states neither prompt nor certain, offenders frequently escaping through the excessive regard for technicalities even more than through the indulgence of juries and the occasional weakness of judges.
It must be remembered that the courts of each state form a judicial system, complete in itself, and independent of the Federal courts, and, of course, of other states. There is no appeal from the highest state court, except in those cases where a question of Federal law is involved, for then such cases may be removed, in manner to be explained hereafter, to the Federal courts. And, subject only to this limitation, the jurisdiction of the state courts covers the entire field of civil and criminal law. The existing legal system of all the states, except Louisiana, whose law is based on the Roman, have been built upon the foundation of the principles contained in the common and statute law of England as that law stood in 1776, when the thirteen colonies declared their independence. In the development of the law since that time the courts of one state are not bound either by law or by usage to follow the decisions either of the Federal courts or of the courts of any other state, any more than they would follow English courts, although such decisions are used and discussed as evidence of the common law, and great deference is always shown to the opinions expressed by the Federal courts. In many states the legislatures have taken action in the development of law by adopting statutory codes of procedure, and in some instances have even enacted codes embodying the substance of the common law fused with the statutes. These latter codes have not, however, received the general approval of the legal profession.
It is, of course, to the state courts that the duty belongs of construing the constitution as well as the statutes of the state, and if they find any state law to be inconsistent with the state constitution it is their duty to declare it invalid. It is also the duty of the state court to declare any state law invalid if it is contrary to the Federal constitution or to a Federal statute or treaty. As in the case of the similar power of the Federal judges, this is founded on no special commission, but arises out of the ordinary judicial function of expounding the law and discriminating between the fundamental law and laws of inferior authority (see post, § 25).
§ 9. Wide as is the range of the rights and powers of a state, and elaborate as is the structure of its government, the state Change in the Political Importance of the State. holds a practically less important position in the American system than it once did, and has not so strong a hold as it had in the first quarter of the 19th century upon the loyalty and affection of its citizens. The political interest and the patriotism of the people generally are now given rather to the nation as a whole than to a state, whereas in the two generations following the Revolutionary War the opposite would have been the case. This notable difference is due not to any constitutional changes, for there has been none except those contained in the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution, but to the three following causes:—
The first is the growth of the party system with its complicated machinery, which has linked the citizens of different states
