Government
Deerfield employs the open town meeting form of government, and is led by a board of selectmen. The town has its own police, fire and public works departments. Like the fire department, the post office has two branches, in South Deerfield (where most of the town offices are) and in Old Deerfield Village, near the Memorial Hall and the Old Town Hall. The town's Tilton Library is connected to the regional library network, and is located in South Deerfield. The nearest hospital, Franklin Medical Center, is located in Greenfield, as are many of the regional state offices.
On the state level, Deerfield is represented in the Massachusetts House of Representatives by the First Franklin district, which includes the southeastern third of Franklin County and towns in north central Hampshire County. In the Massachusetts Senate, the town is represented by the Hampshire and Franklin district, which includes much of eastern Franklin and Hampshire Counties. The town is patrolled by the Second (Shelburne Falls) Barracks of Troop "B" of the Massachusetts State Police.
On the national level, Deerfield is represented in the United States House of Representatives as part of Massachusetts's 1st congressional district, and has been represented by John Olver of Amherst since June 1991. Massachusetts is currently represented in the United States Senate by two Senators, John Kerry, as well as Scott Brown as a result of the death of Ted Kennedy on August 25, 2009.
Read more about this topic: Deerfield, Massachusetts
Famous quotes containing the word government:
“What happens in a strike happens not to one person alone.... It is a crisis with meaning and potency for all and prophetic of a future. The elements in crisis are the same, there is a fermentation that is identical. The elements are these: a body of men, women and children, hungry; an organization of feudal employers out to break the back of unionization; and the government Labor Board sent to “negotiate” between this hunger and this greed.”
—Meridel Le Sueur (b. 1900)
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“In our governments the real power lies in the majority of the community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of government contrary to the sense of the constituents, but from the acts in which government is the mere instrument of the majority.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)