his election-evidenced by deed of conveyance, of record in the Register's office of Shelby county, or by will or inheritance. He shall recommend to the Board of Aldermen, from time to time, such measures as he may deem essential for the public interest; shall call special meetings of the council, when he may deem it necessary; shall see that all laws and ordinances passed by the council and approved by himself, be faithfully and diligently executed; shall have the power to veto any law passed by the council, which law shall not go into effect without his signature, unless again passed by two-thirds of the Board of Aldermen, or unless he fail to return it to the Board with his objections in writing, within ten days after its first passage; in either of which events it shall be as operating and binding as if it had his official signature. If after his election, and during his term of office, he shall remove from the limits of the city, or cease to hold real estate as aforesaid, his office shall thereby be vacated.

men.

SEC. 5. No person shall be an Alderman unless he Qualification and be a citizen of the United States and of the State of power of AlderTennessee, and shall have been a bona fide resident of the city twelve months, and of the ward for which he is elected six months next preceding his election, and an unencumbered fee simple owner, six months previous to, and at the time of his election, of real estate in his ward of the cash value of five hundred dollars-evidenced by deed of record in the Register's office of Shelby county, or by will or inheritance.-Any Alderman, removing from his ward during his term of office, or ceasing to hold real estate as aforesaid in his ward, shall thereby vacate his office; provided, that a Sheriff's deed under tax sale shall not be deemed a fee simple title within the meaning of this act, unless the party claiming under it shall have before that time held actual, exclusive, adverse, open and undisputed possession thereof, for a period not less than seven years.The Board of Aldermen shall have the power to create all offices deemed necessary for the public interest, and shall fix the compensation attached to each before filled, which compensation shall not be increased or diminished during the time for which the office is held. SEC. 6. The Recorder, Treasurer, Wharf Master, Tax Collector and Sexton, shall be elected by the Mayor and Aldermen, and they or any other officer of the city may be dismissed at pleasure, two-thirds of the board present and voting concurring therein.

SEC. 7. The City Marshal, High Constable, Captain of the Night Watch and Engineer, and the other officers

Officers.

Election of May. or and Aldermen.

created by the foregoing Section 6, shall be nominated by the Mayor, and such nomination shall be confirmed. or rejected by the Board of Aldermen, who shall also have power to dismiss any of said officers, provided two-thirds concur in such action; but the Mayor, together with the Captain of the Night Watch and High Constable, shall have the sole power to appoint a day and night police, who shall hold office at the will of the Mayor, or until removed by a two-thirds vote as aforesaid.

SEC. 8. The first election of Mayor and Aldermen, under this charter, shall be held in each ward of Memphis as now laid off, and in the other districts embraced in the 3d Section of this act, by the Sheriff of Shelby county, as he may designate, on the last Monday in December, 1849, after ten day's notice. The voters shall vote by ballot, and only in the ward in which they reside, and only for the aldermen of that ward and for mayor; and no person shall be a qualified voter unless he be a white man, 21 years of age, a citizen of the United States, and of the State of Tennessee, and shall have been an actual bona fide resident of the ward in which he offers his vote six months, next preceding the election at which he offers the same, and shall have paid his corporate taxes for the last past corporate year. The Sheriff shall appoint three judges of election for each ward, who shall take an oath faithfully to perform their duty, and they shall open the polls at 10 o'clock, A. M., and close them at 4 o'clock, P. M., when they shall forthwith proceed to ascertain and certify to the acting mayor the result of the election, and in all cases of a tie vote for aldermen, the mayor shall refer the election back to the voters of the ward, within ten days after the tie is ascertained. The first meeting of the board to be elected under this charter shall be at the usual place of meeting of the Mayor and Aldermen of the city of Memphis, and on the first Tuesday after election.

SEC. 9. The Mayor and Aldermen shall have power to pass all laws necessary to preserve the health of the city, to prevent and remove nuisances, to establish night watches or patrols, to establish and regulate the grade of streets, alleys and other public highways, to license and regulate negro traders, livery stables, auctions, grocery, dry goods, forwarding, receiving and commission and all other mercantile houses; coffee houses, tippling houses, confectionaries, brokers, bankers, pedlars, shows, circuses, theatres, and all other public amusements within the city; to keep in good re

pair, preserve and improve the streets, alleys, sidewalks, public landings and squares; to prevent the erection of buildings dangerous to other improvements, and to designate fire limits, within which wooden buildings shall not be erected; to restrain and punish gaming; to establish inspection laws within the city; to establish and regulate markets, and pass market laws and regulations; to establish and regulate the fire companies and fire works; to regulate the sweeping of chimneys; to establish and regulate pumps, wells, cisterns, &c., on the streets, alleys, public squares, &c., to convey water from the vicinity into the city; to lay and collect taxes for the use and benefit of the city, which shall not exceed three fourths of one dollar for every hundred dollars worth of property, valued at cash prices; to open and widen streets, and to lay off new streets if necessary, always paying the party injured therefor; to license and regulate drays, carts, hackney coaches, and other vehicles in said city; to remove buildings dangerous or hazardous to other property upon paying the owner the value thereof; to lay and collect such a poll tax as they may deem reasonable upon all the inhabitants of the city liable to pay a poll tax to the State; to prevent the introduction of contagious diseases into the city; to make quarantine laws, and enforce them within ten miles of the city; to establish and regulate hospitals, workhouses, and houses of correction; to establish a system of free schools within the city, free from sectarian influences, and to lay a tax not exceeding one-eighth of the city revenue to support the same, provided that all the tax collected in any one Ward for this purpose shall be expended in said ward, and provided also that no more money shall in any one year be expended or liability created on account thereof, in any one ward than the taxes for said year in said ward amount to; and provided further that upon the expressed wish of a majority of the voters in any one ward, no further taxes for free schools shall be collected or levied in said ward until otherwise requested by the majority of voters of such ward; to provide for lighting of lamps, and the erection of all buildings necessary for the use of the city; to improve the navigation of the Mississippi river, within the city limits; to preserve and improve the steamboat and flatboat wharves, and fix the rate of wharfage; to regulate the anchoring and moving of steamboats, and other boats at the various landings within the city, except as hereinafter restricted; to license and regulate porters and their charges; coachmen, hackmen and cabmen and their charges; to

May issue bonds.

regulate all disorderly houses; to regulate the keeping and storage of gun powder and all other combustible articles; to regulate the use of lights, stove pipes and flues, in all shops, stables, sheds and other like places; to provide for the inspection and the weighing or measuring of all kinds of provisions, food, provender, fuel, &c., for man or beast; to provide for the guaging and inspection of all kinds of liquors; to provide for the arrest and confinement, until tried, of all vagrants, riotous or disorderly persons within the city limits; to authorize the arrest and detention of all free negroes, slaves or other persons found violating any ordinance of the city; to pass such laws as may be deemed necessary to control and regulate free negroes and slaves, and to punish them for violation thereof; and to pass all other laws that may be necessary to carry out the full intent and meaning of this act, if not contrary to the constitution and laws of the State of Tennessee.

SEC. 10. The Mayor and Aldermen shall have authority to issue time bonds of the city, for the purpose of borrowing money for the use of the corporation, but said bonds shall not have longer than one year to run; shall not be renewable, and shall not be for an amount larger than the revenue of the last preceding year, and, no new issue shall take place until previous bonds hereby authorized are paid, unless authorized by three unanimous votes of the board ten days a part from each other; Provided, however, that the city of Memphis, by and through its Mayor and Aldermen, and by the subscription of the Mayor on the books of the Memphis and Charleston railroad company, be and is hereby authorized to subscribe for any sum, not exceeding five hundred thousand dollars, of the capital stock of said company, or to subscribe that amount for any road leading from Memphis and connecting with the South Carolina and Georgia works; Provided, that the said rail road subscription shall not be taken by the Mayor and Aldermen, until the vote of the legal voters of the city of Memphis shall have been taken by them, and a majority of those voting decide in favor thereof, and that the Mayor and Aldermen of the city of Memphis, be and are hereby authorized to raise money on loan by pledging the faith of the Corporation; by pledging a portion of its taxes by mortgage or otherwise, as to them may seem best, to an amount not exceeding what may be demanded for the calls upon the stock aforesaid, and said loan may be created for such length of time and payable in such manner as to the said Mayor and Aldermen may be deemed best: also the said

May erect land

Mayor and Aldermen be and they are hereby authorized, if to them it shall seem best, instead of making a loan as aforesaid for the whole amount of said calls, or any part thereof, to issue the bonds of said corporation, under its corporate seal, to be signed by its Mayor and countersigned by its Recorder, for the whole, or any part of its calls which may be made from time to time by said rail road company on said stock; that the bonds so to be issued shall be in sums not less than five hundred dollars each, that they shall not have a greater rate of interest than six per centum per annum, and shall not be payable at a greater distance of time from their respective dates than thirty years. And provided further, that said Mayor and Aldermen shall so soon as the finances of the city will permit, erect two substantial and permanent steam boat landings or ings and wharts. wharves, the one commencing at or near the north edge of Union street and running south, and the other at or near the mouth of Poplar street and running south; both shall be commenced at the same time and may be extended north and south, as the wants of the city may require, but the said Mayor and Aldermen shall have no power to coerce the landing of steam or ferry boats at any named landing within the corporate limits, but the same shall be permitted to land, load and discharge freight or passengers at such point in front of the city (paying reasonable wharfage taxes) as their convenience and the commercial wants of the public may dictate. SEC. 11. Two thirds of the revenue collected in each ward from real estate shall be expended in such ward, expended. unless the Aldermen of the ward otherwise agree, or unless the same be required to liquidate the aforesaid rail road bonds.

Revenue-how

forfeitures--bow

SEC. 12. The county tax hereafter collected within Tax fines and the limits of the city of Memphis, as hereby extended, paid." and also the fines and forfeitures in the Commercial and Criminal Court of Memphis, shall hereafter be paid over by the County Trustee to the Mayor and Aldermen of Memphis, and they shall hereafter defray all charges for jurors, witnesses, and all costs, &c., incident to trials in the Commercial and Criminal court of Memphis, which have heretofore been paid by the county of Shelby; and provided also, that no part of the county revenue ordered by this section to be paid to the City of Memphis, shall be so paid over until the existing debts of the county shall have been extinguished, and in the meantime the cost of jurors and courts, &c., in the Commercial and Criminal Court of Memphis shall be paid by the county as heretofore.