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288 Corporassociations,
operatives,
urities, and
hment and
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ons under
exporting
Members of Congress are chosen
in
biennial elections in even-numbere
d
years by secret ballot of residents who
are citizens of the Territory, 18 year
s
of age or over, andregistered voters. A
regular session of the Congress, which
may continue for 30 consecutive
Calendar days, is held each year beginning the second Monday of July. The
High Commissioner may call a spec
ial
session whenever he deems it in
the
public interest.
The legislative power of the Con8'ess of Micronesia extends to
all
4Ppropriate subjects of legislation,
except that no legislation
may be
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The Third Regular Session of the
Congress of Micronesia took place
from July 10 to August 8, 1967.
During the session, the Congress
passed 48 bills and adopted 30 joint
resolutions. Eighty-four single house
resolutions were also adopted. The
High Commissioner approved and
signed into law 41 bills and withheld
his approval on the remaining seven, in
most cases because of certain technical
defects. (A list of the bills and the
action taken by the High Commissioner on each is included in Appendix
C.)
import,
Orders of the President of the United
States and orders of the Secretar
y of
activities
mm muni-
(Bill of Rights) of the Trust Terr
itor
Code. Further, the Congress may y
not
Among major items of legislation
passed were Public Law No. 3-40
creating a Social Security System; Public Law No. 3-32 providing for improved administration of the tax laws,
Public Law No. 3-41 setting up a
Board of Land Surveying Examiners;
and laws appropriating a total of
$532,500 for programs and projects in
the six districts.
may it tax the property of
non-
Activities of the Congress following
the Third Regular Session included
itricts and
is
tion and
—
sa IS a
ig of a
resenta’s, two
the six
House
embers
singleabout
4apPorMariIslands
Onape
d Yap
inconsistent with treaties
Or international agreements of the
United
States; laws of the United States
ap-
plicable to the Territory;
Executive
the Interior; or Sections 1 thr
ough 12
impose any tax upon property
of the
United States or of the Terr
itory, nor
residents at a higher rate than
that of
residents, The Congress also has
power
to appropriate funds availabl
e from
revenues raised pursuant to
Territory
tax and revenue laws and to
review
and make recommendations
on the
High Commissioner’s propos
ed requests for funds to be appropri
ated by
the United States Congress.
During the year under revi
ew, the
Secretary of the Interior issu
ed Amendment No. 3 of Order No.
2882, the
document which provides
for the
authority and organization
of the Congress of Micronesia. The Ame
ndment
concerns the passage of
bills, the
conduct of elections should
a natural
disaster prevent ballotin
g on the
appointed day, and revenu
es appropriable by the Congress. (Th
e Amendment is reproduced in Append
ix B.)
Part V—Political Advancement
ee
EE
Ts
organization of its Future Political
Status Commission and studies of the
Intcrim Committees on Education appointed by each house. In February
1968, the President of the Senate, the
Chairman of the House Appropriations
Committee, and the Legislative Counsel of the Congress traveled with the
High Commissioner to Washington, D.
C., to appear before the Appropriations Committees of the United States
Congress in support of the Territory’s
budget requests. For the second successive year, one Senator and one
Representative were advisers to the
U.S. delegation to the Trusteeship
Council.
Executive Branch
. Working under the High Commissioner are a Headquarters staff, deFiscal Year 1968
scribed
below,
and
six
district
administrations. All officers function
under the Trust Territory Code and
the Trust Territory Manual of Administration.
The Office of the High Commissioner consists of the Deputy High
Commissioner, the Attorney General,
the Special Assistant and the Assistant
Commissioners for Administration,
Education,
Public
Affairs,
Public
Health, and Resources and Development. The Internal Auditor and the
Public Defender are also attached to
this office.
The five Assistant Commissioners
and the Attorney General perform
both line and staff functions in assisting the High Commissioner in over-all]
direction of the executive branch.
With the Deputy High Commissioner,
they also serve collectively to advise
the High Commissioner on matters of
policy and program, functioning as a
de facto “‘cabinet.”
Under the various Assistant Commissioners are department or division
heads and specialists responsible for
the technical direction of their program operations throughout the Territory, and for provision of necessary
staff, professional and technical services.
Several organizational changes took
place during the year under review.
The Departments of Education and
Public Health, previously under supervision of an Assistant Commissioner
for Community Services, are now each
headed by an Assistant Commissioner.
The former Department of Public
Works
and
the
Engineering
and
Construction Service were combined
into a new Department of Public
Works responsible for design, construction, operations and maintenance.
19