matters, streets
and highways and the like. But there was no general system, nor was
there, save by special legislation, any means by which sanitary
districts could be constituted. In the year 1848 the first Public Health
Act was passed. It provided for the formation of local boards in
boroughs and populous places, such places outside boroughs being termed
local government districts. In boroughs the town council were generally
appointed the local board for purposes of the act. It was not, however,
until 1872 that a general system of sanitary districts was adopted. By
the Public Health Act of that year the whole country was mapped out into
urban and rural sanitary districts, and that system has been maintained
until the present time, with some important changes introduced by the
Public Health Acts 1875 to 1907, and the Local Government Act 1894.

Constitution of district councils.

United districts.

Port sanitary authority.

Powers of urban and rural councils compared.

The whole of England and Wales is divided into districts, which are
either urban or rural. Urban districts include boroughs and places
which were formerly under the jurisdiction of local boards or
improvement commissioners. The power to constitute new urban districts
is now conferred upon county councils, as already stated. There is a
concurrent power in the Local Government Board under the Public Health
Act 1875, but that power is now rarely exercised, and new urban
districts are in practice created only by orders of county councils
made under the Local Government Act 1888, section 57. Rural districts
were first created in 1872. Before that time there was practically no
sanitary authority outside the urban district, for although the vestry
of a parish had in some cases power to make sewers and had also some
other sanitary powers, there was no authority for such a district as
now corresponds to a rural district. There were, indeed, highway
boards and burial boards which had powers for special purposes, but
district authority in the sense in which it is now understood there
was none. Before the year 1894 the rural district consisted of the
area of the poor-law union, exclusive of any urban district which
might be within it, and the guardians of the poor were the rural
sanitary authority. Since 1894 this has been changed. By the Local
Government Act of that year the guardians ceased to be th