(Redirected from Independent cities)
An 'independent city' is a
city that does not form part of another general-purpose
local government entity.
Independent cities should not be confused with
city-states (such as
Singapore), which are fully sovereign cities that are not part of any other nation-state.
North America
United States
In the
United States, an independent city is a
city that does not belong to any particular
county. Because counties have historically been a strong institution in local government in most of the United States, independent cities are relatively rare outside of
Virginia (see below), whose
state constitution makes them a special case. The
U.S. Census Bureau uses counties as its base unit for presentation of statistical information, and treats independent cities as county equivalents for those purposes. Independent cities should not be confused with
consolidated city-counties, such as
Denver, Colorado, the
City and County of San Francisco, California or
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Virginia
Main articles: List of cities in Virginia,
Political subdivisions of Virginia
Of the 42 independent cities in the United States
[1], 39 are in Virginia. The three that are not in Virginia are
Baltimore, Maryland;
St. Louis, Missouri; and
Carson City, Nevada.
In the
Commonwealth of Virginia, all municipalities incorporated as "cities" have also been "independent cities," also called "free cities," since 1871. Other municipalities, even though they may be more populous than some existing independent cities, are incorporated as "
towns", and as such form part of a county. An independent city in Virginia may serve as the
county seat of an adjacent county, even though the city by definition is not part of that county.
Several Virginia counties, whose origins go back to the original eight
shires of Virginia formed in 1634 during the colonial period, have the word ''city'' in their names; however, politically they are counties. Examples are
Charles City County and
James City County. These names originated with earlier "incorporations" created in 1619 by the
Virginia Company as
Charles Citiie (sic) and
James Citiie (sic). The Virginia Company lost its charter in 1624, and Virginia became a royal colony.
Arlington County
Arlington County, commonly referred to as just "Arlington," is not an independent city. However, it is often thought of as a city because it is fully urbanized, is close in size to other independent cities in the state, and includes no municipalities within its borders. It consists solely of some of the land ceded by Virginia to the Federal Government to form
Washington, D.C. in the late 18th century, and
retroceded to Virginia in 1846.
Former cities
''See also:
Lost counties, cities, and towns of Virginia.''
Former independent cities now extinct that were long extant in Virginia include:
★
Clifton Forge, which gave up its
city charter in 2001, and is now an
incorporated town in
Alleghany County.
★
Manchester, which was consolidated by mutual agreement with the
City of Richmond in 1910.
★
South Boston, which gave up its city charter in 1994, and is now an
incorporated town in
Halifax County.
★
South Norfolk, which merged with
Norfolk County in 1963 to form the
City of Chesapeake.
Two other independent cities existed only for a short time:
★
Nansemond, created from the former
Nansemond County in 1972, was merged in 1974 with the then-City of Suffolk and three
unincorporated towns within the county's former boundaries to form today's
City of Suffolk.
★
Warwick, which was formed from the former
Warwick County in 1952, was in 1958 consolidated by mutual agreement with the newly-expanded
City of Newport News.
Other states
Some states have created independent cities in order to cater for the special requirements of governing their largest cities and/or capitals:
★ The
City of Baltimore,
Maryland, has been separate from
Baltimore County since 1851.
★
Carson City,
Nevada, consolidated with
Ormsby County in 1969; however, Ormsby County was simultaneously dissolved.
★ The
City of St. Louis,
Missouri, was separated from
St. Louis County in 1876.
Other entities similar to independent cities
An independent city is not the same as:
★ A
consolidated city-county (such as
Baton Rouge,
San Francisco,
Philadelphia,
Denver,
Jacksonville,
Indianapolis,
Nashville,
New Orleans, or
Lexington), in which city and county (or in Baton Rouge's and New Orleans' cases, parish) government has been merged.
★ A completely urbanized county such as
Arlington County,
Virginia.
★ A "Federated" City-County multi-tiered type of government such as applies between
Miami and
Miami-Dade County
★ The
City of New York, which is a ''
sui generis'' jurisdiction: the city is made up of five
boroughs, each of which is territorially contiguous with a county, each of which has even less power than a county all of which was incorporated into cities would otherwise have.
★
Washington, D.C., which, like the capitals of many other countries (see below), has a special status. It is not part of any
state; instead, it comprises the entirety of the
District of Columbia, which, in accordance with Article 1, Section 8 of the
U.S. Constitution, is under the jurisdiction of the
U.S. Congress. When founded, the District was in fact divided into two counties and two independent cities.
Alexandria County (which now forms
Arlington County and a portion of the independent city of
Alexandria) was given back to Virginia in 1846, while the three remaining entities (the City of Washington,
Georgetown City and
Washington County) were merged into a consolidated government by an act of Congress in
1871 and Georgetown was formally abolished as a city entity by another act in
1895. Congress has established a
home rule government for the city, although city laws can be overridden by Congress. This is fairly rare, and so in practice the city operates much like other independent cities in the United States, although technically, it does not meet the legal definition of one.
★ Cities and towns in
New England traditionally have very strong governments while counties have correspondingly less importance. Today, most counties in southern New England (
Connecticut,
Rhode Island, and
Massachusetts) have almost no governmental institutions or roles associated with them (aside from serving as a basis for court districts). Somewhat like the
ceremonial counties of England, counties in southern New England still have a nominal existence, and so no city or town in those three states is truly separate from a county.
Canada
In the
Canadian province of
Ontario, the same type of city is referred to as a
single-tier municipality (there are also
separated municipalities). In
Quebec they are often called separated cities, as they are not
Regional County Municipalities. Cities and towns in
Alberta are not part of rural municipalities such as counties. In
New Brunswick, all county government was abolished in
1967, therefore, in theory, all cities, townships, and settlements in New Brunswick could be considered independent cities.
Europe
Austria
In
Austria, a similar concept is the ''
Statutarstadt''.
Germany
:''See also:
List of German urban districts.''
In
Germany, different
states have either the ''Stadtkreis'' ("Urban County") or ''Kreisfreie Stadt'' (literally, "County-Free City").
Examples of German independent cities are:
★
Cologne (Köln)
★
Frankfurt (Frankfurt am Main)
★
Leipzig
★
Munich (München)
Additionally, the German cities of
Berlin and
Hamburg function as federal states, while the state of
Bremen is comprised solely of the cities of
Bremen and
Bremerhaven (which was originally founded as an ocean port for the city of Bremen).
Hungary
:''See also:
List of towns in Hungary''
In
Hungary 23 of the cities are "cities with county rights", these cities have equal rights with the 19 counties of Hungary.
The British Isles
Some cities in the
United Kingdom are a
unitary authority, and could be considered to be independent cities. In the UK, however, "city" has no inherent status;
city status depends on a grant from the
monarch and merely confers on the place so-designated the right to call itself a city. The standard for such a right was once thought to depend on whether the entity has a cathedral. As is now made clear by the Department for Constitutional Affairs
[1], there are no formal criteria such as this for the city to apply for, and be granted city status in the UK. It is perhaps remarkable that there are in fact only 66 cities in the UK - 50 in England, 5 in Wales, 6 in Scotland and 5 in Northern Ireland.
County borough referred to a
borough or a city independent of
county council control in
England and
Wales from 1889 to 1972 with the term continuing in use in
Northern Ireland and the
Republic of Ireland. Wales re-introduced the term in 1994 for use with certain unitary authorities.
Asia
Taiwan (Republic of China)
Under the
administrative division system of the
Republic of China, some cities are
directly administered by the
Executive Yuan, some are
administered by provinces(the province of Taiwan is nominal), and some are
subordinate to counties. The centrally-administered and province-administered ones are like independent cities under this definition.
People's Republic of China
In mainland China under the administration of People's Republic of China, the Cities of Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Chongqing are centrally-administered province-level regions, and they do not belong to any particular province. Additionally, there are several vice provincial cities that are nominally under provinces but are in reality independent of any provinces.
Within some provinces, there are some cities that are directly under provinces, bypassing an administrative level (prefectures and prefecture-level cities).
Korea (Republic of Korea)
In addition to its nine provinces,
South Korea has a total of seven province-level "metropolitan cities." By far the largest among these in terms of population is the capital,
Seoul, called a ''teuk-byul-shi'' (특별시; literally, "specially distinguished market", to mean special city), which is home to more than 20% of the entire population of the country. The remaining six independent cities are called ''gwang-yuhk-shi'' (광역시; literally, "large territory market", to mean large city). These include
Busan,
Daegu,
Daejeon,
Incheon,
Gwangju, and
Ulsan.
Historically, these independent cities have been carved from the province that surrounds them. Consequently, they typically share a strong regional and cultural identity with the adjoining province(s). This is particularly true of Gwangju, which is at the center of the southwestern
Jeolla region, and Daegu, which was carved from
North Gyeongsang Province in the southeast. Similarly, Busan and Ulsan are both heavily associated with
South Gyeongsang Province, while Daejeon is heavily associated with the
Chungcheong provinces. Seoul and Incheon are said to make up the "capital region," along with the densely populated
Gyeonggi Province that almost completely encompasses them.
One interesting relic of the newer independent cities is that, in some cases, the government administrative buildings (''docheong'') of the provinces they were once a part of are still located within city boundaries, meaning that these provinces have capitols that are not within their borders.
In 2006, the ruling party floated a proposal to completely eliminate all current province and independent-city borders. This plan would divide the entire republic into fifty or sixty city- or county-level administrations, similar to the system in Japan. The plan was intended to help reduce regional discrimination and animosity by eliminating provincial identity.
National capitals
A number of countries have made their national capitals into separate entities. For example
Copenhagen, the capital of
Denmark, is outside of the country's system of counties, as is the capital of Romania,
Bucharest. The capital of the United States is not within any of the 50 states.
London is actually composed of the
City of London and the county of
Greater London, which is divided into a number of boroughs. The
German capital,
Berlin, is a Federal State with the same level of autonomy as much larger states, such as
Bavaria.
Brussels, the capital of
Belgium, is a separate region (the
Brussels-Capital Region), independent of both
Flanders and
Wallonia, despite being entirely surrounded by Flanders (of which it is also the regional capital) and sharing a common language with Wallonia (
French).
Federal capitals
In countries with a
federal structure, the federal capital is often separate from other jurisdictions in the country, and frequently has a unique system of government.
Examples include:
★ The
Australian capital,
Canberra, is situated in the
Australian Capital Territory;
Bogotá,
Colombia, is formally
Bogotá, Distrito Capital (Capital District).
★
India has a
National Capital Territory of Delhi, which includes
New Delhi, the capital, and
Delhi.
★
Buenos Aires,
Brasília,
Caracas, and
Mexico City, the capitals of
Argentina,
Brazil,
Venezuela, and
Mexico respectively, are each located in a
Federal District.
★
Washington, the capital of the
United States, is located in the
District of Columbia, a capital territory created out of parts of
Maryland and
Virginia, although later the portions of Virginia were removed from the District.
★
Moscow, the capital of
Russia, itself forms a
Federal City, a capital territory, which is one of the 88 "federation subjects" (federal subdivisions) of
Russia.
See also
★
Consolidated city-county
★
Consolidated city-state
★
County borough
★
Unitary authority
★
City-state
References
1.
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