Town (New England)
| Town | |
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Also known as: New England town New England City and Town Area (U.S. Census term) |
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| Category | Municipal corporation |
| Location | |
| Found in | U.S. states in New England |
| Created by | Various colonial agreements followed by state constitutions |
| Created | 1620 (Plymouth, Massachusetts) |
| Number | More than 1,500 (as of 2016) |
| Populations | 41 (Hart's Location, New Hampshire) - 68,318 (Framingham, Massachusetts) |
| Areas | 1.2 sq mi. (Nahant, Massachusetts) - 291.2 sq mi. (Pittsburg, New Hampshire) |
| Government | Town meeting |
The New England town (generally referred to simply as a town in New England) is the basic unit of local government and local division of state authority in each of the six New England states and without a direct counterpart in most other U.S. states. New England towns overlay the entire area of a state, similar to civil townships in other states where they exist, but they are fully functioning municipal corporations, possessing powers similar to cities in other states. New Jersey's system of equally powerful townships, boroughs, towns, and cities is the system which is most similar to that of New England. New England towns are often governed by a town meeting legislative body. The great majority of municipal corporations in New England are based on the town model; statutory forms based on the concept of a compact populated place are uncommon, though they are prevalent elsewhere in the U.S. County government in New England states is typically weak at best, and in some states nonexistent. Connecticut, for example, has no county governments, nor does Rhode Island. Both of those states retain counties only as geographic subdivisions with no governmental authority, while Massachusetts has abolished eight of fourteen county governments so far. With few exceptions, counties serve mostly as dividing lines for the states' judicial systems.
Towns date back to the time of the earliest English colonial settlement, which predominated in New England, and they pre-date the development of counties in the region. Areas were organized as towns as they were settled, throughout the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. Town boundaries were not usually laid out on any kind of regular grid, but were drawn to reflect local settlement and transportation patterns, often affected by natural features. In early colonial times, recognition of towns was very informal, generally connected to local church divisions.
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