b. Who pay the public-land tax mentioned under a, or a tax on capital or on both land and capital, upon a net annual income of not less than 105 florins. c. Who as merchants or manufacturers are taxed upon an annual income of not less than 105 florins. d. Who in the royal free cities or in cities with an organized administration are taxed as artisans upon an annual income of not less than 105 florins. e. Who in the larger or smaller communes pay the income tax for not less than one employee. ART. 7. The right to vote shall belong also to those who pay the income tax on an annual income of not less than 105 florins, which, according to Law 26 of 1868, is rated in the first class; or who pay this tax on an annual income of not less than 700 florins under the provisions of the second class; moreover, those State, municipal, and communal officers may vote who pay the income tax on an annual income of not less than 500 florins under the provisions of the second class. ART. 8. In cases covered by Articles 6 and 7, it is required that electors, to be entered on the voting lists in accordance with the provisions there mentioned, must have already been taxed in the preceding year upon an income not less than that fixed above. ART. 9. Without regard to income, the following may vote in the electoral districts in which they have their fixed residence: The members of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, professors, members of academies of fine arts, physicians, lawyers, notaries public, engineers, surgeons, druggists, graduates of agricultural schools, foresters and mining engineers, clergymen, chaplains, communal notaries, teachers and licensed kindergarten teachers. It is required, however, that pastors and chaplains in order to exercise the right to vote shall actively officiate as such in some officially established congregation. Professors, school teahcers, kindergarten teachers and communal notaries, on the other hand, shall have the right to vote only in case they have been legally appointed or elected to their position or have been confirmed therein. ART. 10. Persons under paternal authority, under guardianship, or under employers' authority, even though they possess one of the qualifications mentioned in the preceding section, shall not have the right to vote. The apprentices of merchants and artisans and those employed in public or private service as servants or domestics shall be regarded as being under employers' authority. Overseers of estates are not regarded as under such authority. 1. By soldiers in the army, sailors and members of the national guard, whether on active duty or temporarily on leave during their term of enlistment, but reservists and members of the national guard summoned in conformity with Article 36 of Law 40 of 1868 and Law 32 of 1873 for military inspection and temporary service are not included within this provision. 2. By members of the finance, customs and revenue police. 4. By members of the State, municipal and communal police. Therefore they shall not be registered in the lists of voters. ART. 12. The right to vote shall not be exercised by those: 1. Who have been condemned to imprisonment on account of some crime or misdemeanor, or of some violation of the press laws mentioned in Articles 6 to 12 of Law 18 of 1848, during the continuance of such imprisonment. 2. Who, on the basis of a valid judicial finding, are being held for trial because of some crime or misdemeanor. 3. Who have been disqualified as voters by a regular judicial proceeding, during the time fixed by the judicial sentence. 4. Who have become bankrupt, until they are discharged. Such persons shall, therefore, not be registered in the list of voters, even if otherwise entitled to vote. The electors mentioned in Clauses 1, 2, 3 and 4, if otherwise entitled to vote, shall be registered in special lists and may by way of exception exercise the right to vote on proof of acquittal or of their discharge from bankruptcy by a valid judicial decision, or if they can furnish evidence by certificate from the competent authorities that they have served the full term of their sentence, or upon proof, by reference to the original judgment, that the term of their disabilities has expired; such evidence to be submitted to the commission charged with the preparation and correction of the lists of voters or, finally, to the president of the election. ART. 13. Every elector who has reached his twenty-fourth year shall be eligible as a representative, provided he is registered in the list of voters and is qualified in the Hungarian language, which in accordance with law is the legislative language. Those sentenced after the present law has become operative by a regular judicial proceeding on account of murder, robbery, arson, larceny, concealment, forgery, fraud, fraudulent bankruptcy, or perjury shall not be eligible. LAW 7 OF 1885. ALTERING THE ORGANIZATION OF THE TABLE OF MAGNATES.1 CHAPTER I.—THE ORGANIZATION OF THE TABLE OF MAGNATES. ARTICLE 1. Members of the Table of Magnates shall be those who have the right to sit and vote therein by virtue: a. Of hereditary right. b. Of their high rank or office. c. Of their appointment for life by His Majesty the King. d. Of election by the Diet of Croatia-Slavonia in accordance with Law 15 of 1881. ART. 2. By virtue of hereditary right the following shall be menbers of the Table of Magnates: a. The archdukes of the royal family who are of full age. b. All male members of 24 years of age of families which have heretofore had the right of membership in the Hungarian Table of Magnates or which had received from the Hungarian King the title of count or baron in Transylvania before the union of that principality with Hungary, if they alone or together with the wives and minor children living in a common household with them possess and enjoy or have a life interest or a family interest in trust in real estate within Hungarian territory, assessed upon the new cadaster of 1885 for the direct national land tax to an amount of not less than 3,000 florins, Austrian value, including therein the house taxes upon residences and industrial establishments attached to such real property. With reference to families of magnates whose members, besides their rights in the Hungarian Upper House, have by birth or in some other manner a seat and vote in the legislature of another State of the monarchy or of any other country, it is provided that, if they possess the property qualification mentioned in Clause b of this Article by virtue of their real property located in Hungarian territory, their rights in the Hungarian Upper House shall not be exercised unless they deliver once for all to the president of the Royal Hungarian Ministry a declaration that they for themselves will exercise such right only in the Hungarian Upper House; this declaration shall be made within six months after the completion of the twenty-fourth year, and if such age has already been reached, before 1 July 1885. The president of the ministry shall transmit this declaration to the president of the Table of Magnates within eight days after its 1 Chaps. 2, 3 and 4 of this law are omitted; they contain provisions regarding the appointment of officers, order of business and other matters of less importance. 2 Croatia-Slavonia elects 3 members of the Table of Magnates. receipt, if the Diet is in session, and if it is not in session, within eight days after its assembling. c. Hungarian citizens by birth and their legitimate male descendants in a direct line, upon whom His Majesty, upon the proposal of the Council of Ministers, has especially conferred the right of hereditary membership in the Table of Magnates, in addition to the corresponding title (duke, count, or baron). Hungarian citizens who are not such by birth may be granted membership in the Upper House upon the proposal of the Council of Ministers only by means of legislation. In either case the Council of Ministers may propose only Hungarian citizens of merit who have attained the age of 24 years, are of age and possess the property qualifications provided by this article. ART. 3. If a member of one of the families designated in Clauses and c of Article 2 does not possess the required property qualification, or loses it later, his right shall cease from that time but shall be revived if he afterward regains this qualification. In the latter case the right may be exercised in the session following the one in which the qualification is established. ART. 4. By virtue of their high rank or office, and during the continuance thereof, the following shall be members of the Table of Magnates: A. a. The standard bearers of the Kingdom and the Count of Pozsony (Pressburg). b. The two curators of the Crown. c. The governor of Fiume. d. The president and vice-president of the Supreme Court and the president of the Court of Appeals of Budapest. B. Also by virtue of their high rank and of their offices the following shall be members of the Table of Magnates during the continuance of their ecclesiastical offices: a. The Roman Catholic Church dignitaries of the Latin and Greek rite in the lands of the Hungarian Crown, viz., the Prince Primate of Hungary and the other archbishops, the bishops of dioceses, and the likewise royally appointed suffragans of Belgrade and Tinnin (Knin), and finally, the Archabbot of Pannonhalma (Martinsberg), the Provost of Jászó and the Prior of Auranien. b. The dignitaries of the Oriental Greek Church: the Servian Patriarch, the Roumanian Metropolitan and the bishops of dioceses. c. The three senior bishops of the Evangelical Reformed Church and of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession; the three senior superintendents of the Evangelical Reformed Church, taking into account the religious district of Transylvania, especially the senior superintendent: the inspector general and the two senior direct inspectors of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession; and finally, one of the senior presidents, either bishop or superintendent, of the Unitarian Church. ART. 5. Those whom His Majesty the King appoints, upon the proposal of the Council of Ministers, from among the citizens of all the countries of the Crown of St. Stephen, in recognition of merit and to increase the prestige of the Upper House thereby, shall be life members of the Table of Magnates. As soon as the upper house is organized in accordance with the present law, the number of members appointed for life shall not exceed 30. In future such appointments shall take place gradually, and in no case shall more than five appointments be made in one year. The total number of life members shall never exceed 50. ART. 6. The fact that a person is engaged in military service, is in the active performance of a civil or religious office, or is appointed to such a position, imposes no obstacle to the exercise of a right of membership in the Table of Magnates belonging to him, or to his being named a hereditary or life member thereof. ART. 7. Should new offices or positions of high rank be created or should new bishoprics or ecclesiastical districts be established by the religious confessions mentioned in Article 4, such offices and positions shall not carry with them the right to a seat in the Table of Magnates, unless this is expressly provided by law. ART. 8. The members designated by Article 1, Clause d, shall have the right to take part in the deliberations and voting only with reference to the matters common to the countries and provinces of the Hungarian Crown. ART. 9. Without prejudice to the provision of Article 59 of Law 30 of 1868,1 no person shall be a member of the Table of Magnates who does not satisfy the provisions of Article 1 of Law 44 of 1868, according to which Magyar is the only language of legislation. ART. 10. Members of the Table of Magnates shall lose their membership in the following cases: a. A member by virtue of his high rank or office, when he ceases to hold such office or position, because of voluntary resignation or of legal disciplinary or judicial proceedings. b. A life member, when his resignation is accepted by His Majesty, upon the proposal of the Council of Ministers. c. A member elected by the Diet of Croatia-Slavonia, when his term of election expires. 1 The law which permits the members from Croatia Slavonia to use their own language in the Hungarian Diet. |