Government.— The present constitution was adopted in 1876 and has not been extensively amended since. The chief elective officials are the governor, attorney-general, treasurer, com missioner of the general land office, superin tendent of public instruction and commissioner of agriculture, together with three railroad commissioners. The chief officials appointed by the governor are the secretary of state, adju tant-general, three penitentiary commissioners and 14 other officers whose duties relate to insurance and banking, taxes, revenues, public health, State purchasing, game, public buildings, labor, mines, pure foods, reclamation of lands, pensions, fires and masonry inspection. The judiciary is elective. In ascending order there are Justice and Municipal Courts, County Courts, District Courts, each with one judge or presid official. Above these are nine Courts of Civil Appeals above which are the Court of Criminal Appeals and the Supreme Court. Each of these higher courts has three judges elected in rotation every two years for six year terms. The legislature meets biennially and consists of a senate of 31 members elected alternately every two years for four-year terms and a house of 142 members elected for two year terms. There have been numerous called sessions. The State is divided into four United States judicial districts and into 16 Congres sional. Of the 18 congressmen two are, there fore, elected at large. Voting is restricted to males over 21 who have paid the poll tax and have lived one year in the State and the last six months in the district or county where the voting is to be done. The old convention system of selecting officials has been largely replaced by the general primary. The salaries of the State officials are not large. The gov ernor has somewhat more power than is usual in the other States and he controls a consider able amount of patronage. He appoints nearly 40 State boards and a two-thirds vote of both house and senate is required to overcome his veto. In general the county is the local unit of government. Spanish influence has caused some civil law to be incorporated into the com mon law. Law and equity are not dif ferentiated, common-law forms of pleading have been abolished, and a Penal Code and a Code of Criminal Procedure dates from 1856. Texas has been the pioneer in adopting the community property system, in exempting the homestead from liens, in the commission form of city government, in the regulation of rail way stocks and bonds, in the regulation of farm tenant rents.
State Finances.— In 1915 the total assessed valuation was $2,755,171,793, upon which was levied a total State ad valorem tax of 55 cents on the $100. This tax, together with _charter fees, poll and occupation taxes, etc., produced a total revenue from taxation of about $13,240, 000. To this should be added an income of $2,140,170 arising from the State Permanent School Fund of nearly $68,000,000. The uni versity and the Agricultural and Mechanical College possess endowments derived, like the Permanent School Fund, from the sale of State lands set apart for the schools in early days, which yielded an income of about $260, 000. Expenditures were as follows: State de partments, $1,633,505; judiciary, $1,057,197; eleemosynary, institutions, $2,861,876; Con federate pensions and homes, $1,558,171; mis cellaneous, $262,821; higher education, $1,754, 077; public schools, $7,999,059. Income and ex penditures are increasing at least 5 per cent a year. Of the ad valorem tax of 55 cents, five cents is specifically set aside for Confederate pensions, 20 cents for the public schools. The State debt is negligible, but the total debt of the counties exceeds $30,000,000; of the cities it is about $60,000,000. County tax rates are gen
erally under $1 on $100 but in some cases the city rates reach $2.
Education.— To the $7,999,059 spent by the State on the public schools in 1915 should be added. $6,387,866 raised by local taxation in counties, districts and cities and $518,628 de rived as income from Permanent County School Funds, similar to the State Permanent Fund, and amounting to nearly $13,000,000. On about 1,100,000 children of free school age Texas spent in 1915 about $14 per child. There are nearly 25,000 teachers, of whom scarcely 1,500 hold college degrees, of whom about 3,000 hold certificates that would admit to standard colleges. The rural schools are open scarcely six months per year. There is such pressing need of improving rural education that the legislature of 1915 appropriated $1,000,000 for the purpose and it is probable that this amount will be increased in future. A compulsory law now going into effect will cause a much needed improvement in attendance. The high schools, between 500 and 750 in number, are of very un equal merit but are improving fairly rapidly. The training and the salaries of teachers are in creasing. The value of the public school buildings exceeds $30,000,000. Receipts from sales of school building bonds were $2,847,891 in 1915; the amount collected by local taxation for redemption and interest on bonds was $1,719,682. There are numerous private second _ ary schools. The native white illiteracy was 6.1 per cent in 1900, 4.3 per cent in 1910; of negro illiteracy 24.6 per cent in 1910, 38.6 per cent in 1900.
There are State normals at Huntsville, Den ton, San Marcos, Canyon City, Commerce and Alpine for whites and at Prairie View for negroes. The Girls' Industrial College is at Denton, the Agricultural and Mechanical College (which has income from the United States and from other sources not enumerated above) for boys is at Bryan, the University of Texas is at Austin with the exception of the medical depart ment which is at Galveston and a school of mines at El Pago. These State higher schools, whose total enrolment, regular session, exceeds 8,000, are almost wholly supported by biennial legislative appropriations. There are nearly 50 private and denominational colleges of various grades, with an attendance in excess of 14,000. Chief among. these are the new Southern Metho dist University at Dallas and the Rice Institute (endowment over $10,000,000) at Houston, to gether with the much older Baylor University (Baptist) at Waco, Southwestern University (Methodist) at Georgetown, Austin College (Presbyterian, for boys) at Sherman, Trinity (Presbyterian) at Waxahachie and Texas Christian University at Fort Worth.
Charities and Corrections.— Three insane asylums, with a total of 4,000 inmates, are located at .Terrell, Austin and San Antonio. There is an epileptic colony at Abilene; a blind institute, a deaf, dumb and blind institute for negroes, a deaf and dumb institute, a Con federate home, a woman's Confederate home and a farm colony for feeble-minded are at Austin; an orphan's home is at Corsicana; a juvenile training school for boys is at Gates ville and for girls at Gainesville; a tuberculosis sanitarium is at Carlsbad. In addition to these State-maintained institutions there are numerous denominational and private hospitals and retreats of very various kinds. The State penitentiaries, containing usually from 4,000 to 5,000 inmates, are at Rusk and at Huntsville, and, mainly through farming, are designed to be self-supporting, but have in recent years created large deficits.