Local government in the Philippine islands,

CENTRAL AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS

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brought to life at the instance of the sovereign power. In
the absence of constitutional provision, it is said that the
power to create implies the power to control and even to
destroy. 4o It is a historical fact that local government
was anterior to the State, and that the people first enjoyed
the blessings of local government before they ever came under the sway of higher political organizations. And in the
United States, we are told, local governments were either
simultaneous with, or preceded, central authority. 407 The
406 Booten v. Pinson (1915) L. R. A. n. s. 1917-A. 1244.
407 In Maassachvsetts, originally a democracy, the two may be said
to have been at first identical; but when the colony became a representative government, and new bands pushed out into the wilderness,
they went bearing with them grants of land and authority for the
conduct of their local affairs.-Hurchinson's Massachusetts Bay, ch.
1; Washburn's Jud. Hist. of Mass., ch. 1; Body of Liberties, 62, 66,
72; Eliot's New England, Vol. 4, pp. 425, 427. But in Connecticut,
the several settlements originated their own government, and though
these were doubtless very imperfect and informal, they were sufficient
for the time being, and the central government was later in point of
time. Trumbull's Hist. of Conn. Vol. 1, pp. 132, 498; Palfrey's NNew
England, Vol. 1, p. 454. What the colony did was only to confer
charters, under which the town authority would be administered within
agreed limits, and possibly, with more regularity than before. In
Rhode Island, it is also true, that township organization was first
in order of time. Arnold's Hist. of R. I. ch. 7. This author iustly
remarks that, when the charter of Rhode Island was suspended to
bring her under the dominion of Andros, "the American system of
town governments, which necessity had compelled Rhode Island to
initiate fifty years before, became the means of preserving the liberty
of the individual citizen when that of the state, or colony, was
crushed."-Vol. I p. 487. So in Vermont, the people not only, for
a time conducted all their public affairs in towns and plantations,
through committees, officers, and leaders, nominally appointed and
submitted to by general consent and approbation, but they carried
on their controversy with New York for some years, without any
other organization.-Williams' Hist. of Vermont, Vol. 2, p. 163. In
New Jersey, as in Massachusetts, towns were chartered in connection
with grants of land, and in some instances, those which were made
by Nichols, adverse to the proprietary, were suffered to remain after
his authority was superseded.-See instances in Malford's Hist. of
N. J. pp. 143-144. The charter to Lord Baltimore plainly recognized