From among their number the municipal councilmen select a president
who is regarded as mayor of the commune, though many of the duties
elsewhere pertaining to mayors are discharged by an official called
the syndic. The councilmen are supposed to be elected for a term of
two years, but the oft repeated revolutions have interfered as
seriously with their terms of office as with everything else. The
average Dominican seems to manifest little interest in his municipal
elections; my question as to when the last local election was held
would generally be answered with uncertainty: "Last January, no, last
April, no, I believe it was in November." After all, the elections
have usually been mere ratifications of slates prepared beforehand. In
the time of Heureaux the lists of new councilmen were often arranged
in the capital and a few days before election remitted to the various
towns, even with a designation of the person whom the council was
later to choose as its president.
The results of such a method of selection of councilmen has not been
as unfavorable as might be expected.
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