Council of State (composed of a
president and eight councillors named by the king) was set off to
serve as an administrative court, while at the same time an inferior
administrative jurisdiction was conferred upon the _giunta_ (prefect
and certain assistants) of the province. In practice to-day, when the
legality of acts committed by the administrative officials is called
in question, the ordinary courts exercise jurisdiction, if the
question is one of private _right_; if it is one merely of private
_interest_, it goes for decision to an administrative tribunal. In
most continental countries _all_ cases involving the legality of
official acts fall within the domain of the administrative
courts.[561]

[Footnote 561: There is a brief description of the
Italian judicial system in Lowell, Governments and
Parties, II., 170-178.]

V. LOCAL GOVERNMENT

*423. Historical Basis.*--In her ancient territorial divisions Italy had
once the basis of a natural and wholesomely decentralized system of
local government. Instead of availing themselves of it, however, the
founders of the present kingdom preferred to reduce the realm to a
_tabula rasa_ and to erect within it a wholly new and symmetrical
hierarchy of territorial divisions and governmental organs. By a great
statute of March 20, 1865, there was introduced in the kingdom a
system of provincial and communal organization, the essentials of
which were taken over in part from Belgium, but more largely from
France. The functions and relations of the various local agencies were
amplified and given substantially their present form in the law of
December 30, 1888, supplemented and amended by acts of July 7, 1889,
and July 11, 1894. So closely has the French model been adhered to
throughout that the resemblance between the two systems amounts almost
to duplication. The system of Italy calls, therefore, for no very
extended independent description.

The units of local government are four in number--the province, the
_circondaro_, the _mandamento_, and the commune. Of these, the first
and last alone possess vitality, distinct interests, and some measure
of autonomy; and throughout the entire series runs that same principle
of thoroughgoing centralization which is the pre-eminent characteristic
of the local governmental system of France. The _circondaro_, (p. 384)
corresponding to the French _arrondissement_, is essential