Search results
The first wave of home rule reform in the United States started in 1875 and lasted through the 1930s. Massachusetts missed this first wave, but it joined other states in passing a constitutional guarantee of home rule in a second wave of adoptions that began in the post-World War II era.
Section 2 of the Home Rule Amendment, provides: "[a]nycity or town . . . [has] the power to adopt or revise a charter or to amend its existing charter . . . [the provisions of which] shall not be inconsistent with the constitution or any laws enacted by the general court in conformity with the powers reserved to the general court by section eight."
People also ask
When did Massachusetts adopt the Home Rule Amendment?
When did home rule reform start?
Does the home rule amendment empower municipal governments?
What is a general-purpose home rule local government?
This publication, “Principles of Home Rule for the Twenty-First Century,” represents the culmination of a year-long process of research, drafting, outreach, and refinement. The principles are a hopeful vision for the future of state-local relations, grounded in the lessons of more than 130 years of experience with home rule.
- 907KB
- 79
region to find out how home rule functions in practice. The results suggest that the standard story about home rule in Massachusetts is largely a myth. Indeed, promising but largely overlooked avenues for regional reform exist that would involve expanding—rather than limiting—home rule. Among the report’s key findings are: 1.
- 622KB
- 119
Ratified in 1966, the Home Rule Amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution (Article 89) explicitly provides that every city or town in the Commonwealth is entitled to a charter and outlines the process for the adoption, revision and amendment of a charter.
Author: Alvin D. Sokolow. Also referred to as local control, community autonomy, and self-governance, home rule is the principle that local governments in the American federal system should possess a high degree of discretionary authority in serving their communities. The contrast is with strong state government control over community public ...
With the adoption of the Home Rule Amendment (Article 89) to the . Massachusetts Constitution in 1966, and the companion Home Rule Procedures Act (MGL Ch. 43B), city and town voters could begin to select for themselves the form of government which is best suits to local needs.
