Whereby it is contrived, not only that the authority of all the
patricians in the decision is equal, and that business is quickly
despatched, but also, that everyone has absolute liberty (which is of
the first necessity in councils) to give his opinion without danger of
unpopularity.
28. But in the councils of syndics and the other councils, the same
order is to be observed, that voting is to be by ballot. But the right
of convoking the council of syndics and of proposing the matters to be
decided in the same ought to belong to their president, who is to sit
every day with ten or more other syndics, to hear the complaints and
secret accusations of the commons against the ministers, and to look
after the accusers, if circumstances require, and to summon the supreme
council even before the appointed time, if any of them judge that there
is danger in the delay. Now this president and those who meet with him
every day are to be appointed by the supreme council and out of the
number of syndics, not indeed for life, but for six months, and they
must not have their term renewed but after the lapse of three or four
years. And these, as we said above, are to be awarded the goods that are
confiscated and the pecuniary fines, or some part of them. The remaining
points which concern the syndics we will mention in their proper places.
29. The second council, which is subordinate to the supreme one, we will
call the senate, and let its duty be to transact public business, for
instance, to publish the laws of the dominion, to order the
fortifications of the cities according to law, to confer military
commissions, to impose taxes on the subjects and apply the same, to
answer foreign embassies, and decide where embassies are to be sent.
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