Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2014 January 30

= January 30 =

God, King, and Republic
God is king. But why king? I mean, a republic is a country without a king. Most countries nowadays are republics. Great Time (talk) 02:53, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * What has the one got to do with the other? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:05, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Is "God, King, and Republic" some recognised expression? If so, Google doesn't know about it.  "God, King and Country" is part of the Scout Promise. What exactly are you objecting to?  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  03:14, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I think the question is, why refer to God as a "king", if we no longer believe in kings.
 * That will vary from believer to believer, but I would venture that the most common answer (or at least, the most common Protestant-in-a-broad-sense answer) would be, we no longer believe in Earthly or human kingship, but it's different for God. Lyrics from My Country 'Tis of Thee:
 * Our fathers' God, to thee
 * Author of liberty
 * To thee we sing
 * Long may our land be bright
 * With freedom's holy light
 * Protect us by thy might
 * Great God our king
 * Consider that this is to the tune of God Save the King, and the deliberate contrast should be clear. --Trovatore (talk) 03:32, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * My interpretation of this may be suspect at best, but my impression is that Jesus specifically is taken at least by some to have "despoiled the pricipalities" (expression from, I guess) of the world. Start with the Old Testament contention that among all the kings of the world those of Israel are special.  Then there was something (I forget what now) where the Jewish priests made it clear that the Romans had some role in proclaiming a king, and there's actually an article Mark 15 about some of the back-and-forth with Pilate, ending in the final mocking "I.N.R.I", which is taken, I suppose, as an inadvertent but meaningful coronation.  The theory, then, is that by this means the ancient practice of kingship passed away from the world, as only the still living Jesus possesses valid royal authority.  Despite obvious earlier precedents, and the widespread shameful practice of claiming a divine right of kings afterward, there is some argument to be made that the transition to democracy is at least in part a consequence, rather than contradictory, to this theology - after all, democracy has been largely associated with "Western civilization", and San Marino, founded by Christians seeking refuge from persecuting Romans, is the world's oldest extant democracy.
 * To editorialize a moment, I'd suggest the peculiarities of Christian kingship are illustrated by Emperor Norton I, who madly insisted he was the ruler of North America, and, eventually, exerted some privileges from this role. All very absurd, and yet, he is given credit for appearing before a racist mob that intent on doing harm to local Chinese workers, and stopping them with prayers.  Which, to be sure, is a more noble authority than all the Tudors.  The royal power was passed on, in a most non-traditional way, to the Widow Norton, and to this day the Imperial Court System somehow makes use of it to do significant amounts of charity.  Who (apart from Laozi, that is) would have predicted that nobility, liberated from its power and wealth, would become noble, and thereby the source of meaningful power, or that the irrational respect for kings, liberated from the confines of sanity, would become sane? Wnt (talk) 12:31, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I think it has less to do with whether you live in a monarchy or republic and more to do with the Jewish and Christian faith. If you follow either religion, it is implicit that you accept God as your king. See our article Kingship and kingdom of God. Alansplodge (talk) 16:00, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Definitely correct. The Bible unambiguously speaks of God as king in several of the Psalms (e.g. Psalm 93 and Psalm 97), which both Jews and Christians accept (and in numerous places in the New Testament, so the dispensationalist Christians don't see it as something not relevant to Christianity), so it's rather necessary for both Jews and Christians to accept the concept.  Being much less familiar with Islam, I can't say anything beyond what's in the article Alansplodge links.  Nyttend (talk) 01:33, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Great Time -- Unless your religion allows believers to vote to dethrone your god and install a new god, then "republic" may not be the best metaphor for divinity... AnonMoos (talk) 00:51, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

You are right that the ancient notion of God as a king who has the right to rule is incompatible with modern ideals of egalitarian democracy. God is a human invention, constructed in ancient human cultures which had very different values than modern democracies. They believed in the right of kings to rule in return for protection from enemies, and organized themselves into tribes and kingdoms by common ethnicity. The same cultures and thus Biblical stories supported other practices we find abhorrent today, such as genocide, seizure of land through conquest, and (eternal) torture as punishment for wrongdoing. Medieval European societies that translated and edited the Bible also operated as monarchies for a long time; remember the Magna Carta didn't appear until 1215, and modern democracy didn't really start getting implemented in most European countries until the 1600s and 1700s. The Bible also encodes beliefs from ancient and medieval physics which have been obsoleted by modern science, such as that the sky is a hard sphere, above which there is a space which could support a habitat to which one could physically ascend. Abrahamic religions demand the abandonment of democratic decision-making when it comes to matters of morality or any other issue upon which God issues orders, including a different set of arbitrary dietary and worship requirements for each one. Bible-believing Christians are not free to criticize God's decisions, moral judgments, or leadership style in the same way they are free to criticize their political leaders. -- Beland (talk) 16:16, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Does Islam likewise consider God to be "king", either explicitly or implicitly? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:24, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Not really an expert, but Kingship and kingdom of God says it does. -- Beland (talk) 18:22, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

God as king is a theme which abounds in the Old Testament. The first third of the [extremely long] musaf service of Rosh Hashana is littered with biblical quotes describing God as "King" or referring (as in Exodus 15:18, the last verse of the Song of the sea, which from memory might be the first one chronologically in the Bible) to God reigning. What modes of worship have to do with current fashions of political form is difficult to grasp. Come back in 500 years and unconstitutional monarchy might or might not be all the rage again, worldwide, but the Bible will be the same. --86.12.139.50 (talk) 16:55, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Rich Christian Countries
The world is divided into rich developed countries and poor developing countries. All the rich countries are Christian. All the Christian countries are rich. Rich Christian countries include America, European countries, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. They are Western, Northern, and First World countries. Britain began and invented the Industrial Revolution and had the world's largest colonial empire. America is the world's only superpower, has the world's largest economy, and is a very capitalist and anti-communist country. Why? What do Christians think about it? Great Time (talk) 03:02, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Who says so? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:04, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Japan isn't Christian. —Nelson Ricardo (talk) 04:40, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * South Africa isn't particularly rich, isn't first world and is decidedly not Northern. Mingmingla (talk) 05:16, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Technically speaking South Africa was First World by the correct original definition, but it's definitely not an MDC (the more acceptable term these days). Sorry, always been nitpicky about that one, especially when some people say the US might become a Second or Third World country.... Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie &#124; Say Shalom! 29 Shevat 5774 13:20, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Which World does Detroit belong to these days? --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  22:28, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * There's quite a few poor Christian countries as well. Look at Haiti (regarded by some as the least fortunate country in the Western Hemisphere) as a good example. Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie &#124; Say Shalom! 29 Shevat 5774 13:15, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Correlation does not imply causation. And instead of saying "all the rich countries are Christian", it would be more accurate to say most (not all, particularly those in East Asia) rich countries are "European", in the sense of having European-derived cultures. The Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution gave Europe a technological lead over the rest of the world that translated into greater wealth. Europe is historically Christian, and since those rich countries have European-derived cultures, those rich countries are consequently majority-Christian. Whether being Christian has anything to do with Europe getting rich in the first place is debatable; some historians have argued so with such theories as the Protestant work ethic, but there are just as many historians critical of such explanations. —SeekingAnswers (reply) 04:57, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * It has much more to do with geopolitics and econoimic systems rather than theology. Per capita, some of the richest and poorest countries are in the middle-east (non-Christian); the main difference being political / economic systems. E.g.: Qatar is #1, Yemen is #150 (per IMF list: List of countries by GDP (PPP) per capita) ~:71.20.250.51 (talk) 06:42, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Great_Time -- During much of the middle ages, most Christian realms (other than the Byzantine empire and certain Italian cities) were really not too rich. At various times, Muslim and/or Chinese empires were almost certainly richer than any medieval Christian state. For some interesting discussion on possible factors in why this changed, you can see "The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community" by William H. McNeill (a semi-classic book of a type which professional historians aren't really allowed to write anymore...) -- AnonMoos (talk) 00:45, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I am going out on a limb here to go one step further. For most the the history of christianity, christian countries have been poor relative to China and India. I do not have sources for all that period, only parts of it. The reason the trip Columbus made was to find a shortcut to the wealthy India. China would probably have been good too. Unfortunately for India, once it was easily accessible to Europe, it was up for plunder. If anyone has good sources either verifying or debunking my statement for at least most of this period, I would welcome those. DanielDemaret (talk) 09:00, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * There have been quite a few books that have tried to explain why christian Europe in particular, and consequently its descendants in America have became so successful. Some books emphasize the competition and free thought brought on by many small states in proximity of each other. Some emphasize religion, especially Lutheran work etic values. There are almost as many theories here as there are theories on the fall of Rome. My personal favorite is The_Origins_of_Political_Order. I recommend it warmly. I am not going to give the book justice in this single paragraph, but let me just ramble on a bit on what I think may be relevant to your question:
 * The main parts to the success, according to this book stems from  1) A working Rule of Law in Europe.  2) The first universities.  3) The competition and free thought due to many small states, leading to both social and military innovations. He contrast this to India and China. These three factors took hundreds of years to be entrenched, but finally bore fruit. The author brings up how the Justinian law that the catholic church re-introduces around 1070 or so, which had several consequences. By adding rights to women not to be forced to remarry within her tribe, and other limitations in family law, one consequence was the abolishment of tribal society which the rest of the world is still clinging too in the non-christian areas, and which lessens the role of the Rule of Law, by corruption from loyalty to family and tribe rather than loyalty to the state. Another consequence was that interest in this law was so great that it led to people travelling from all of Europe to the place to Bologna, the place where these old laws were discovered, established the first University ever, the University of Bologna. ( As an interesting side-note, now that women suddenly had the right not to marry, they did not. Within 50 years, half of all land and local political positions in Catalonia (northern Spain) and in southern France belonged to women. This was reversed by the reformation. ) The two main points here are that the Rule of Law became firmly established in Europe and also the first University. The third point was made was that the power that the catholic church got from this was used, during the time it had to power to do so, to make European countries to refrain from wars costly in lives and avoid a pan-European state. By keeping a lot of small states alive, competition in science and technology took off. The author contrasts this in a very interesting way with the history of China and that of India. China was very brutally integrated very early into one huge state, which had its advantages, among them a central learned and state-loyal mandarin bureaucracy, but left China with the disadvantages of lack of competition of ideas and also left it with corruption from latent tribalism. India was only for short periods of time integrated, and therefore lacked an overall Rule of Law.  DanielDemaret (talk) 09:47, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Great Divergence is an excellent article on the very question of why European countries became economically dominant in recent centuries. I agree the correlation with Christianity is merely a coincidence. If other countries had for reasons of natural resources, economic system, innovative culture, or whatever, become economically dominant, they would have brought their local religion(s) along with them. For example, if an Indian kingdom had colonized Australia, it wouldn't be a Christian country now. -- Beland (talk) 16:23, 3 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I'd say Christian nations became rich despite Christianity. That is, whenever the teachings of Christ conflicted with getting rich, they pretty much ignored His teachings, which included included extensive charity for the poor, not lending money for interest, etc.  Muslim nations, by contrast, maintain many such religious rules or customs, such as prohibiting usury. StuRat (talk) 18:38, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

For most of its history, christian countries have been poor. Looking at the success of South East Asian schools these last few years, it could also be a temporary state of affairs. DanielDemaret (talk) 08:32, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

United States television networks and the State of the Union
In the United States, every year, the Big Four television networks (ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC) all air the State of the Union simultaneously. The program is not profitable for them, since they can't sell any commercial advertising during the speech. Meanwhile, the fifth major network, The CW, instead of airing the State of the Union, airs counterprogramming which is very profitable for them, with the CW consistently, year-after-year, achieving ratings significantly above their norm on that night because none of the other broadcast networks are competing against them with non-State of the Union programming.

I have heard that the Big Four air the State of the Union, despite its unprofitability, because they are mandated to do so by the FCC. Is this true? If so, why doesn't the FCC also mandate the CW to air the speech as well?

—SeekingAnswers (reply) 04:42, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure about any FCC regulations. What I do know is that the major difference is that the CW, as a relatively newer network, does not have any type of national news division. For decades (probably dating back to the late 1940s when TV in the US was beginning to spread accross the country), the news divisions of the three major networks (ABC News, CBS News, and NBC News) have always pre-empted regularly scheduled programing to air live, uninterrupted coverage of significant, breaking news stories. The State of the Union address has always been considered one of them. And although Fox does not usually air news programs, it does air Fox News Sunday and a couple of others in the past, produced by its sister cable network Fox News Channel. Airing live news events, without any commercial advertising, brings credibility to the news divisions. It also showcases their anchors, reporters and pundits. The hope was, for example, a loyal viewer of ABC World News would stay with ABC News' coverage of the event, and then tune in for all of the analysis afterwards, instead of going to another network or news organization. Although the proliferation of the cable news networks have decreased this effect, not everyone in the country has cable and regularly watches CNN and the like. Thus, there is still no incentive for the major networks to stop there practice of pre-empting regularly scheduled programing to air live, uninterrupted coverage of significant, breaking news stories. Zzyzx11 (talk) 07:13, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * If there is any FCC regulation, it may be related to what the FCC considers to be a "network". The CW currently only airs 20 hours of programming over six days, and it does not offer any national news or sports programming. That may be below the FCC's minimum limit. One of the reasons why Fox stayed afloat and grew in its early years was that it tried to stay below the FCC's limit back then, and thus could do things that the Big Three could not. Zzyzx11 (talk) 07:36, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * And report the stories the Big Three dare not. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:58, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I suspect that they realize if they don't show things like the State of The Union address voluntarily, Congress would mandate that they do, so they might as well do it voluntarily, and get some credit for it. StuRat (talk) 09:24, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * There is no FCC requirement to air the State of the Union speech, and given the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, it is dubious whether either the FCC or Congress could in fact enforce such a law. Supreme Court interpretation only allows content-based rules in extremely limited circumstances. -- Beland (talk) 16:30, 3 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I believe the US Supreme Court has ruled that since broadcast TV uses limited radio frequency bands, this is a publicly held resource, and that those can be fully regulated by the FCC. The Fairness Doctrine was one such example of this.  Cable TV is different.  Satellite could probably be argued to be lumped with either. StuRat (talk) 18:48, 3 February 2014 (UTC)


 * Clearly the FCC can regulate content since they have levied fines against networks for profanity and wardrobe malfunctions. —SeekingAnswers (reply) 00:19, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

British "grammar school"
From what I understand from reading articles, the British "grammar school" just refers to a higher education with multiple subjects. Why is it referred to as a grammar school when grammar is not what is taught there (I assume proper grammar would be covered in early education!); thanks! -- 140.202.10.134 (talk) 16:01, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * It is a historical usage which persisted while the role of the establishments changed. According to grammar school "The original purpose of mediaeval grammar schools was the teaching of Latin ... The schools were attached to cathedrals and monasteries, teaching Latin – the language of the church – to future priests and monks." Gandalf61 (talk) 16:16, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * ... and, of course, it refers to a school for secondary education that selects the most able students. Some comprehensive schools offer more subjects, and teach more subjects per pupil, than many grammar schools.  (Higher and further education follow on from secondary education in the UK.)    D b f i r s   17:45, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I'll just qualify that: grammar schools selected on ability. However, where technical schools existed (parts of the industrial West Midlands, for example), grammar schools selected on ability in arts and humanities, while technical schools selected on ability in sciences. The selection was made by means of the 11-plus exam. Those who did well in arts and humanities were sent to grammar schools: those who excelled in sciences were sent to technical schools: everyone else went to secondary moderns. (I was a product of this system, but the standard of teaching of sciences was so poor and sexist that I went off sciences until after I'd left school.) --TammyMoet (talk) 12:23, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * That might have been true in some regions, but in most areas the 11-plus was just a test of general intelligence, including Mathematics and word usage, but no science, arts or humanities. What was the content of the 11-plus papers that you took?  I can still remember the general content of mine (taken well over 50 years ago) but can't quite remember exact questions.  I think the early years of the 11-plus in England included some arts and humanities, but these questions were dropped because of the class bias (I would have been less successful on those topics).  Papers might have been different elsewhere ( I'm not trying to ascertain your age! )    D b f i r s   21:44, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * No the 11-plus was the selection test and was generally abolished when selective education was abolished. The only question I remember, and it was from the year before's paper that we did as prep for our test, was "How long is a piece of string?". I was also coached extensively before the test as I showed promise, and the headteacher was absolutely amazed when I didn't go to the local grammar school but to the technical school instead. He said it must have been the questions they asked. Not every region in England had technical schools; they seem to have been mainly located in the industrial areas as I mentioned originally, and your area may have been one of these. There are very small parts of England that still have grammar schools and so they still use the test. (The answer to the question, by the way, is "from its beginning to its end", in case you wondered.) --TammyMoet (talk) 13:02, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Your 11-plus tests must have been much more "arty" than mine. I'm sure mine had only well-defined questions with logical answers.  I'm glad I didn't have to answer your papers!   D b f i r s   13:54, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I must agree with Dbfirs here - my 11-plus test questions were all along the lines of "What is the next number in this sequence?", "Which of these words belong in this sentence?", "What is 14% of 791?" - very little in the way of creativity was required. Tevildo (talk) 15:00, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Obituary for John Henry Phillips (born 1876, Sun Prairie Wisconsin)
Can you help me find an Obituary for John Henry Phillips (born 1876, Sun Prairie Wisconsin)?

I am looking for biographical information on this individual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.98.224.98 (talk) 16:36, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Do you have any information on names of spouse, children, etc.? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:08, 30 January 2014 (UTC)


 * There's a little bit of information here. Clarityfiend (talk) 05:21, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * After a thorough rummage, the only other thing I could find was a newspaper report of (possibly) his parents' 50th wedding anniversary in 1918, on the "Society" page of the Madison Capital Times: September 14, 1918 in the second column from the left (beware, the preview times-out with a message asking you to buy a subscription, so read it quickly!). Alansplodge (talk) 16:32, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * The John Henry Phillips of Tuckahoe, N.Y. mentioned in that report is probably the architect who designed his own house. That architect seems to have had offices at 681 Fifth Avenue in New York City. I also found a 1903 passport application on ancestry.com for a J.H. Phillips, born Feb. 12, 1875 in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. The application lists his occupation as architect and he was at that time a resident of Chicago.--Cam (talk) 05:06, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

In which cultures do the "man-hug" exist?
In which cultures do the "man-hug" exist? 140.254.227.69 (talk) 18:50, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * The subject comes up to some extent in the Hug article. I wouldn't say it's an excessively rigorous article. But I do like the statement, "Some cultures do not embrace hugging..." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:15, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Town lines and bodies of water
Since this has more to do, I think, with legal boundaries and not necessarily computer science, I'm putting this question here.

That said, if you do a search for Bristol, Vermont in Google Maps it will outline Bristol with a red dashed line. Through the town there is what appears to be a double dashed line going down the New Haven River. Zooming in, the line can be seen as two lines with one on each side of the river running along the banks. Following this west, if you search again for New Haven, Vermont which is the next town over, it shows the same double line along the river again. Does this mean that the rivers and other waterways are not under town jurisdiction but instead state controlled? I wouldn't think so since I tried the same search with other towns and found another with a river bisecting the town, Waitsfield which has the Mad River running through it, but no similar lines run down the length of that river. What's the deal with the New Haven River? Dismas |(talk) 23:16, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * How sure are you it's not a glitch in Google Maps?  -- Jayron  32  00:50, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I tend to think it's an error in Google Maps (of which I've found several over the years). I happen to have a DeLorme atlas of Vermont showing town lines, and it does not show town lines along the New Haven River through Bristol or New Haven.  I did some searching online and could find no evidence that the river was outside the towns' jurisdiction or under state jurisdiction. I will contact Google Maps and alert them of the possible error.  I will try to remember to report their response when I receive it, probably not for a couple of weeks.  Marco polo (talk) 00:55, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Agreed. All territory in Vermont is incorporated, except for four grants and gores (and seemingly Lake Champlain); three of the four are in the far northeastern corner, and the exception (Buels Gore) is still some miles away from Bristol.  Also see 24 V.S.A. §2, the relevant portion of the Vermont Statutes Annotated: Addison County is composed of Bristol, 21 other towns, the city of Vergennes, and unincorporated bits of Lake Champlain; there aren't any other pieces of unincorporated territory in the county.  Nyttend (talk) 01:22, 31 January 2014 (UTC)


 * In many states (such as Washington): The waters (of Washington State) collectively belong to the public and cannot be owned by any one ...; and in some instances access to such cannot be prohibited.  See: Water rights    —Yes, I know we're not talking about Washington, but that was the 1st search response 71.20.250.51 (talk) 09:17, 31 January 2014 (UTC) Presumably, water that flows adjacent to, or thru, a municipality is considered public property, outside of any local jurisdiction.


 * While collective public property is inconsistent with private ownership, it is not inconsistent with local jurisdiction. Vermont towns are not private bodies. They are public entities. Towns in New England certainly have jurisdiction (again, different from private ownership) over ponds within their boundaries.  I am fairly certain that they have jurisdiction over streams as well.  Your quote from Washington State doesn't say anything about state jurisdiction over bodies of water.  It just prohibits private ownership.  Presumably in Washington State, municipalities also have jurisdiction over bodies of water entirely within their boundaries.  Marco polo (talk) 22:51, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * 25 V.S.A. § 141 demonstrates that there's public control over streams, and you can't gain ownership of a stream via prescription or by adverse possession. I can't find a specific definition of what's considered un-ownable by private individuals (10 V.S.A. § 1422 defines public waters, but it doesn't specify how far up the riverbank that goes, for example), but what you're looking for is probably findable in 10 V.S.A. Chapter 49.  Finally an actual answer to the question.  10 V.S.A. § 1424 (f)(1) notes that the Secretary of something or another may delegate navigable-water-governing authority to "a municipality which is adjacent to or which contains the water".  It wouldn't be possible for a municipality to contain navigable waters if the boundaries can't include those waters.  Nyttend (talk) 23:41, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Of course, an important distinction is to be made between the water, and the dirt under the water. Borders are defined by the dirt, not the water... -- Jayron  32  04:00, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Not always. See about the dispute over whether the Kentucky border was at the low water mark of 1792 or the modern low water mark, which was settled only in 1991. Rmhermen (talk) 17:21, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
 * But is it even the low-water mark? See Handly's Lessee v. Anthony for a case in which the answer was held to be an unambiguous Yes, since otherwise "states and nations would find their jurisdiction expanding and contracting with the seasons and the tides".  Nyttend (talk) 18:33, 1 February 2014 (UTC)


 * As a side issue, you might be interested in the part of the Delaware border called Twelve-Mile Circle which ends up granting all of a stretch of the Delaware River to Delaware, as a relic of the Duke of York's deed to William Penn. Part of the New Jersey mainland is actually the property of Delaware due to this. μηδείς (talk) 18:11, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

You may have better luck with openstreetmap.org. For example a search on "Boston, MA" on Google Maps highlights only the land under the city's control. A similar search on OpenStreetMap shows what I think is the correct legal boundary, that the City of Boston has jurisdiction over the parts of the Atlantic Ocean between the mainland and the islands that are part of Boston, all the way out to the edge of Massachusetts waters. (See tidelands.) The various levels of government have concurrent jurisdiction on water in similar ways they do on land. For example, the Boston Police can pull you over for speeding on a Massachusetts-owned road in Suffolk County, and so can the Massachusetts State Police.) Unfortunately, there's no OpenStreetMap boundary for New Haven, Vermont.  The article on New England town may also be of interest. -- Beland (talk) 18:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you to Nyttend, Beland, and the rest for your replies! I can't wait till I start on my goal of being in the 251 Club. It's a loose sort of club whereby a person has visited all 251 towns and cities in the State of Vermont. Dismas |(talk) 00:59, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Dismas, why use an external link, when an internal link will work? WP:WHAAOE.  Nyttend (talk) 01:11, 4 February 2014 (UTC)