15. LOCAL GOVERNMENT. As in other large and populous countries, the work of gov ernment in England* is classified as being either national or local. This classification has no reference to the place in which the work is done or to the area benefited; in England at any rate, it is based in practice — whatever may have been its origin — exclusively on the sys tems upon which these two branches of public administration are organized and controlled. That part of the work of government which is undertaken by the national organization of the state, directed from its capital, and ad ministered under the direct orders of its ex ecutive head or principal legislature is termed national government; and is, indeed, by his torians, politicians, and citizens alike, often ex clusively thought of as government. That part which is left to subordinate organizations, re lating only to particular geographical areas within the state; and which is immediately directed by and responsible to authorities be longing to those areas, subject only to more or less supervision, help, and superior control by the national government, is termed local gov ernment. In England and Wales, even more than in most other countries, the choice of the particular functions of government to be thus left to local authorities, and the amount and kind of the supervision, help, and superior con trol exercised by the national government in respect to each of these functions, have been determined rather by historical antecedents than by any consistent or logical theory. The aggre
gate amount, variety and relative importance of local government has, during the past three quarters of a century, steadily increased; until it has come in the United Kingdom, nearly to equal in magnitude (measured by the annual cost of. administration) that of the national government itself. This increase has not been due to any transfer of services from the sphere of national to that of local government. Such few transfers as have occurred (like that of the prisons in 1877) have been actually in the other direction. The enormous development of English local government has been due, partly, to the great expansion of the cities, which need more government than rural dis tricts, partly to the progressive demand for new and increased services such as schools and libraries, and partly to the tendency to transfer the administration of services of common use from the sphere of private to that of public— usually local — administration.