The facilities offered by the city for education in all the arts and sciences are ample and of high order. At the base lies an extensive system of kindergartens and primary grade schools, above which are the grade schools, junior high schools and high schools. In addition there were in 1914 30 night schools of all grades, with 451 teachers, 77 playgrounds with 133 instructors, 87 school physicians and 35 school nurses. The total number of teachers in day schools was 3,108, of whom 451 were men. The cities of Massa chusetts have a large amount of local auton omy in school affairs and Boston has made full use of this privilege. The city spends al ready $6.89 per capita for the support of schools, therein leading all the cities of the United States, and would undoubtedly spend more were there not legal restrictions on the amount which may be spent for school pur poses. Indeed, this financial restriction upon the powers of the city has had the bad effect in the last few years of necessitating a larger number of pupils per teacher, the ratios in 1914 being 43 to 1 in the grade schools, 29 to 1 in the high schools and 26 to 1 in the kin dergartens. The annual expenditures for all purposes in 1914 were $84.69 per attending pupil in the day high schools and $41.36 per attending pupil in the day elementary schools.
The city itself offers no higher education except through its library, which now has over 1,000,000 volumes in its collection and maintains 30 branch libraries and reading rooms. It circulates annually over 2,000,000 volumes. Instruction in the arts is given by the School of Drawing and Painting, housed in the Museum of Fine Arts, and in music by the New England Conservatory of Music. as well as by a number of other schools and private teachers. Boston University (q.v.) is within the city limits and just across the river lies Cambridge, which has been the seat of Harvard College, now Harvard University (q.v.), for nearly 300 years, and to which the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (q.v.) is moving in 1916. The Lowell Institute, founded in 1838 with an endowment of $237,000, offers each year a number of courses of free lectures of a high order. The Boston Symphony Orchestra has already edu cated a large group of people to an appre ciation of the best in music.
The constitution of Massa chusetts puts almost no restrictions upon the power of the legislature to make laws for cities. The legislature, meeting annually in the city of Boston, and observing the rising im portance of the metropolis in the affairs of the State, has seen fit to keep in its own hands al most the whole legislative power in the city's affairs. The legislature enacts each year a large number of bills for the government of Boston alone or for the metropolitan district. In 1897 it was asserted that in the past 75 years the leg islature had passed 532 special acts affecting the city or the towns which have been annexed to it; another count showed over 400 from 1885 to 1908. The number of such special acts seems to
increase rather than decrease. Some affairs have been taken entirely out of the control of the city, such as the police department. The State legislature is, in a real sense, the chief governing body of the city.
Boston had no charter as a city until 1822, when its population was al ready approaching 50,000 and town government was no longer possible. Between 1822 and 1909 the city had many minor changes of gov ernment, but it was through a large part of that period governed by a mayor with little power, a small board of aldermen and a large council. From the first the mayor was an elec tive officer and the tendency was for his powers to increase at the expense of those of the coun cil. The large, double-chambered council came to be thoroughly discredited because of its in efficiency and its tendency to play politics. In 1909, following an investigation of the financial methods and condition of the city, the legisla ture enacted a new charter framed by a com mittee of citizens, which gave more power and responsibility to the mayor, and substituted for the old unwieldy council a body of nine men elected at large for three-year terms. The mayor now serves a four-year term, but may be recalled at the end of his second year. His salary is $10,000 annually. He has extensive power over the annual budget, for the council only may reduce it, and that only upon a two thirds vote. His appointments to the chief places in the administration require no alder manic confirmation, but may be rejected by the State Civil Service Commission. Most minor positions are filled under civil service rules laid down by the State commission. Members of the council receive $1,500 per year. As a body they may reduce the budget and they have also the ordinance power, including the power to create and to abolish city departments.
The city's school system is under two boards. The school committee, composed of five mem bers elected at large, has charge of the cur riculum and the staff of teachers. The school house commission, which has charge of the physical plant and the erection of new build ings, is composed of three members appointed by the mayor.
Elections come annually. Nominations are by petition. At present 3,000 signatures of bona-fide voters are required to nominate a candidate for the mayoralty, 2,000 signatures for a place in the council or on the school com mittee. The nominations and the elections are non-partisan, Boston being the first large city in the country to use this feature, and second only to San Francisco in the system of election at large for the council.