WISCONSIN BLUE BOOK


The right to coin money, raise an army, regulate interstate commerce
are among those powers which are granted to the United States
government.
  All of the remaining powers are reserved to the state or to the
people. Thus the state has a much broader field of potential powers.
Obviously, however, the state could not carry out all of the duties
necessary to keep order within it so it authorizes smaller units of
government to do certain tasks for it. Thus it tells the county to have
a register of deeds, a county clerk, certain courts and court officers.
Because the county was considered too large to do certain things,
the state created another level of government called towns, cities
and villages, which also received certain jobs to do.
   Counties and towns may do only those things which the state ex-
pressly tells them they may do, but cities and villages may do any-
thing which is local in nature and which has not been expressly for-
bidden. This broader authority of the city and village is called
home rule.

     The Framework of Its Government-- The Constitution

   Every state has a Constitution setting forth the basic principles of
that government's organization and operation. Such a document
must be approved by the voters before the state is admitted to the
Union, but the Constitution may subsequently be altered or replaced
by a new one. When the Congress of the United States in 1846
passed legislation enabling Wisconsin to become a state, a convention
was called to draft a Constitution, but this document was rejected
by the people and a second effort had to be made. This second Con-
stitution was approved by the people in 1848 and has been in effect
ever since.
   Since the adoption of the first 10 amendments to the United
States Constitution, the state constitutions typically contain a bill
of rights which is a statement of rights of the people which the gov-
ernment may not restrict. Free speech, trial by jury, religious free-
dom, right of petition are among those guarantees which are set up.
Because of the long struggle to obtain and hold these rights, the
early Americans were jealous of them, but today they are so gen-
erally accepted that few people realize their significance or the
efforts made to obtain them. They are contained in Article I of the
'Wisconsin Constitution.
   Another important basic consideration is the privilege of voting.
 Our Constitution sets forth who may vote and how voting is to be
 done. It is interesting to note that the drafters of the Constitution
 sensed that the privilege of voting might be extended so they pro-
 vided that the legislature could extend the privilege if a majority of
 the people voting on a referendum for such purpose approved it.
 Then, in recent years the legislature provided that people who had
 not resided here for one year could vote for presidential electors,


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