Agram, and a Royal Supreme Court at
Budapest. The twelve contain, in all, 200 judges; the Royal Supreme
Court contains 92. All judges are appointed by the king. Once
appointed, they are independent and irremovable. Only Hungarian
citizens may be appointed, and every appointee must have attained the
age of twenty-six, must be of good moral character, must be familiar
with the language of the court in which he is to serve, and must have
passed the requisite legal examinations. Salaries vary from 3,840 to
10,000 crowns. Supreme administrative control of the judicial system
is vested in the Minister of Justice. The sphere of his authority is
regulated minutely by parliamentary statute. In the main, he
supervises the judges, attends to the legal aspects of international
relations, prepares bills, and oversees the execution of sentences.

*559. Local Government: the County.*--The principal unit of local
government in Hungary is the county. The original Hungarian county
instituted by St. Stephen about the year 1000, was simply a district,
closely resembling the English county or the French department, at the
head of which the king placed an officer to represent the crown in
military and administrative affairs. Local self-government had its
beginning in the opposition of the minor nobility to this centralizing
agency, and in periods of royal weakness the nobles usurped a certain
amount of control, first in justice, later in legislation, and finally
in the election of local officials, which in time was extended legal
recognition. At all points the county became substantially autonomous.
Indeed, by 1848 Hungary was really a confederation of fifty-two
counties, each not far removed from an aristocratic republic, rather
than a centralized state. For a time after 1867 there was a tendency
toward a revival of the centralization of earlier days. In 1876 laws
were enacted which vested the administration of the county in a
committee composed in part of members elected within the county, but
also in part of officials designated by the crown; and a statute of
1891 went still further in the direction of bureaucratic
centralization. More recently, however, the county has undergone a
slight measure of democratization.

Exclusive of Croatia-Slavonia, there are in Hungary to-day 63 (p. 507)
rural counties and 36 urban counties or towns with municipal rights.
In Croatia-Slavonia the numbers are 8 and 4 respectively. The urban
counties a