COURTESY THE LIBRARY CONGRESS “LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT.—The self-government which developed and is recognized in the Republic is not simply a custom in the units termed municipalities or States, of managing their local affairs; but a degree of freedom in the individual to engage in the various pursuits of life, unrecognized elsewhere at the period when the Republic was formed, and yet unknown where centralization prevails, whether he chooses to act by himself or in association for civil or religious