=Consolidation Difficult in District System.=--The process of consolidation is always difficult where the district system prevails. Both custom and sentiment cause the people to hesitate or refuse to abandon their established form of organization. If a community has been incorporated for any purpose and has done business for some years, it is always difficult to induce the people to make a change. They feel as if they were abdicating government and responsibility. They hesitate to merge themselves in a larger organization, and hence they advance many objections to the consolidation of their schools. All this is but natural. The several communities have been living apart educationally and have been in a measure strangers. They have never had any occasion to meet in conference, to exchange thought, and to do business together; hence they fear and hesitate to take a leap in the dark, as they conceive it, and to embark upon a course which they think they may afterwards regret. Consolidation frequently fails because of false apprehensions due to a lack of social organization. =Easier in Township System.=--It is quite otherwise where the township system exists. Here there are no separate corporations or organizations controlling the various schools. The school board administers the affairs of all the schools in the township. Hence there is no sentiment in regard to the separate and distinct individuality of each school and its patronage. There are no sub-districts or distinctly organized communities; a whole township or two townships constitute one large district and the schools are located at the most convenient points to serve the children of the whole township. The people in such districts have been accustomed to act together educationally as well as politically, and to exchange thought on all such situations. Hence consolidation, or the union of the several schools, is a comparatively easy matter.