United States
As with the shires of Anglo-Saxon England, counties in U.S. states are administrative divisions of the state in which their boundaries are drawn. Where they exist, they are the intermediate tier of unitary state government, between the statewide tier and the immediately local government tier (typically a city, town or village). Counties are used in 48 of the 50 unitary states; the other two states (Connecticut and Rhode Island) have abolished their counties as functional entities, and Massachusetts is in the process of doing so. Of these remaining 48 states, 46 use the term "county" while Alaska and Louisiana use the terms "borough" and "parish", respectively, for analogous jurisdictions.
Depending on the individual state, counties or their equivalents may be administratively subdivided into townships, or towns in the New England states, New York, and Wisconsin. In these cases, the township is generally subordinate to the county, which is generally subordinate to the state. Michigan, since 1947, has distinguished between "townships" (not self-governing) and "charter townships" (self-governing). In most states, municipal corporations (i.e. cities, villages or towns) file their reports to the state through the county. In Virginia, however, all cities are independent and report directly to the commonwealth government; but notwithstanding they are not part of the county, they might operate as a county seat (e.g. the Independent City of Fairfax is the seat of Fairfax County, though it is not legally within Fairfax County). California has abolished its townships, though may general law cities continue to use the word "Town" as part of their name (e.g. "Town of Atherton" when it is, legally, the City of Atherton).
Louisiana has entities equivalent to counties called parishes. Alaska is divided into boroughs, which typically provide fewer local services than do most U.S. counties, as the state government furnishes many services directly. Some of Alaska's boroughs have merged geographical boundaries and administrative functions with their principal (and sometimes only) cities; these are known as unified city-boroughs and result in some of Alaska's cities ranking among the geographically largest "cities" in the world. Nevertheless, Alaska considers such entities to be boroughs, not cities. Alaska is also unique in that more than half the geographic area of the state is in the "Unorganized Borough", a legal entity in which the state also functions as the local government.
New York has a unique system where 57 of its 62 counties are independently-operated administrative divisions of the state, with normal county executive powers; while the remaining five are administrative divisions of the City of Greater New York. These five are each called borough in context of City government – Manhattan, The Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island (formerly Richmond); but are still called "county" where state function is involved, e.g., "New York County Courthouse", not "Manhattan". The county names correlate to the borough names as follows: New York County = Manhattan, Bronx County = The Bronx, Queens County = Queens, Kings County = Brooklyn, and Richmond County = Staten Island.
In two states and parts of a third, county government as such does not exist, and county refers to geographic regions or districts. In Connecticut, Rhode Island and parts of Massachusetts counties exist only to designate boundaries for such state-level functions as park districts (Connecticut) or judicial offices (Connecticut and Massachusetts). In states where county government is nonexistent or weak (e.g., New Hampshire, Vermont), town government may provide some or all of the local government services.
Most counties have a county seat, usually a city, where its administrative functions are centered. Exceptions include the nation's smallest county, Arlington County, Virginia, which contains no municipalities. In several instances throughout the nation, a municipality has merged with a county into one jurisdiction so the county seat is coextensive with the county. This is the case in the City and County of San Francisco, CA, and in the City and County of Philadelphia, PA. A similar arrangement is found in the "Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County" where the metropolis of Nashville has merged into the county of Davidson (but, other than Nashville, a few municipalities - such as Belle Meade - still exist with some administrative functions). Miami-Dade in south Florida is a unique example of the merger of some functionality resulting in a two tier arrangement of governmental authority and administrative responsibility. New York City is famously coextensive with five counties or boroughs: the Bronx (which is Bronx County), Brooklyn (Kings County), Manhattan (New York County), Queens (Queens County), and Staten Island (Richmond County). Some New England states use the term shire town to mean "county seat".
Read more about this topic: County
Famous quotes related to united states:
“What chiefly distinguishes the daily press of the United States from the press of all other countries is not its lack of truthfulness or even its lack of dignity and honor, for these deficiencies are common to the newspapers everywhere, but its incurable fear of ideas, its constant effort to evade the discussion of fundamentals by translating all issues into a few elemental fears, its incessant reduction of all reflection to mere emotion. It is, in the true sense, never well-informed.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“The United States is a republic, and a republic is a state in which the people are the boss. That means us. And if the big shots in Washington don’t do like we vote, we don’t vote for them, by golly, no more.”
—Willis Goldbeck (1900–1979)
“In one notable instance, where the United States Army and a hundred years of persuasion failed, a highway has succeeded. The Seminole Indians surrendered to the Tamiami Trail. From the Everglades the remnants of this race emerged, soon after the trail was built, to set up their palm-thatched villages along the road and to hoist tribal flags as a lure to passing motorists.”
—For the State of Florida, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Printer, philosopher, scientist, author and patriot, impeccable husband and citizen, why isn’t he an archetype? Pioneers, Oh Pioneers! Benjamin was one of the greatest pioneers of the United States. Yet we just can’t do with him. What’s wrong with him then? Or what’s wrong with us?”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“In no other country in the world is the love of property keener or more alert than in the United States, and nowhere else does the majority display less inclination toward doctrines which in any way threaten the way property is owned.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)