Fatuska János – Fülöp Éva Mária – ifj. Gyuszi László (szerk.): Annales Tataienses II. A mezőváros, mint uradalmi központ. Mecénás Közalapítvány. Tata, 2001.

Molnár András: Zalaegerszeg mezőváros önkormányzati reformja

The reform of self-government in Zalaegerszeg (1844 —1847) András Molnár The liberal county government paid its marked attention to the activity of the market-towns' self-government in the county. The county government had a legal supervision over the self-governments and checked the administration of their public funds. Since the activity of the market-towns' self-government had been slightly regulated - rather only in general - by the contracts that had been made with the landowners, the proceedings, which were mainly based on customory law and were unsettled in detail, had opened a door to several abuses. The market-towns had year by year layed complaints against the election of certain officials or against their abuses and speculation. The county management had tried to prevent the future abuses by working out a municipal law, precisely paraphrasing the jurisdiction and tasks of the market-towns' self-governments, and by enforcing the law. During the 1840s the regulation of almost every market-town in Zala county was come up for discussion in the general assembly of Zala county. The most important of all was the regulation of the self-government of Zalaegerszeg that had been an episcopal market-town and the chief town of the county. It was significant because the liberal administration of the county had introduced the same reforms in 1844 as those that had been planned for settling the free royal towns by the liberal opposition of the diet in Pozsony. For example the magistrates had been elected by great masses of the market-town population on the account of the people's property and not by a selected elector staff (the sexagenarians or the outer council). The duty of the outer council had been taken over by the general assembly of the market-town citizens. The general assembly in Zala county accepted the detailed settling plan of the self-government of Zalaegerszeg in March, 1846, and the local conservatives protested at the sovereign in vain because the liberal municipal law was in force until the spring of 1848. The reform of self-government in Zalaegerszeg had practically overtaken the revolutionary transformation by three years. 207