Re: CHAT: postcodes

Quoting Nik Taylor <yonjuuni@...>:

> Tristan wrote:
> > BTW... someone mentioned 'counties in Anglo-Saxon countries'... In
> > Australia, we don't have counties. I understand these to be equivalent
> > to cities
>
> I'm not sure about in England, but in the US, counties are subdivisions
> of states.  Most counties will have several towns and cities, but a few
> very large cities have incorporated their county.  New York City has
> spread over five counties.
Right. To my understanding, Tristan's comment was closer to the
role of counties in England.  In the US, every state assigns
different powers and functions to nonmunicipal local governments;
the federal government has at best a minimal role.  They also
go by different names:  in Louisiana, they're called parishes,
while in Alaska they are boroughs and in the New England states
they can be called townships.  All US states are in principle
unitary states like most European nations, and so counties have
usually no permanent rights of autonomy unlike the states, but in
practice there is a strong tendency, especially in the South,
to delegate much power to the local level. (In Texas, this was
elevated into a principle of government:  at one time, all county
courthouses had to be so centrally located that each citizen
could travel to the seat, vote, and return home in a day.) The
number of these local governments is entirely dependent on the
state: Texas has the most with 254 counties, but Alaska, more
twice Texas' size, has but 16 boroughs.  Here are some of the
powers and duties assigned to counties in Texas:

<http://www.county.org/counties/function.asp>
<http://www.county.org/counties/structure.asp>

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Thomas Wier            "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
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