The council acts upon all matters in which two or more districts are
interested and the matter is formulated and submitted at once to the
people of such districts for their approval or disapproval. But in
any matter of great importance the people are not compelled to wait
for the regular meeting of the council, but may by the action of the
communities place the matter before the executive committee which meets
every day, and it becomes their duty to submit the question to a vote
of the people. In this way, under this system, the people can always
secure prompt action, as it is the duty of their officials to serve,
but not to govern, as they do in the outer world.
If a public improvement is agreed upon, the districts and communities
interested, make an appropriation of necessary material and labor,
and the work is pushed forward. In all things this great council is
advisory in its character and the executive committee only takes such
action as the people have agreed upon, and when any matter has been
agreed upon the executive power acts at once without question. The will
of the people is the law which no one ever assumes to question.
We passed rapidly through a large number of magnificent structures,
filled with exhibits of all kinds. In Machinery Hall were samples of
every conceivable mechanical device. Another vast building was devoted
to textile fabrics of all kinds. Every industry had its exhibit.
All the great Grand Divisions had similar buildings. Everywhere,
accommodating attendants were ready to show us anything and give us any
information we wished. And one remarkable thing was, that while every
one seemed anxious to display the goods on exhibition, no one ever
tried to sell us anything, as would have been the case in the outer
world.
Here, as MacNair said, was indeed a miniature picture of a world. I
could write a volume on each one of these great buildings without
exhausting the subject. But for the present I had seen enough and
requested Norrena to conduct us next to the Library of Universal
Knowledge which was the most highly finished and imposing of all
these palatial structures. It was built of the usual semi-transparent
material which shut out the direct rays of the sun while it admitted a
mellow radiance rendering artificial light as a rule unnecessary.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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