The future of American governance may not be found in Washington, but in city halls across the continent. While federal institutions struggle with partisan paralysis, cities are quietly rewriting the social contract.
The City as Laboratory
When the Trump administration announced U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement in 2017, over 400 U.S. mayors signed a pledge to uphold the accord's commitments anyway. This wasn't symbolic protest—it was functional governance.
Cities control enough regulatory authority to make meaningful climate progress: building codes, zoning laws, transit systems, energy procurement. Los Angeles committed to 100% renewable energy by 2045. San Francisco banned natural gas in new buildings. New York City mandated green roofs.
These aren't marginal actors. Urban America represents 80% of GDP and 62% of the population. When cities act collectively, they govern de facto.
Constitutional Tension
But there's a problem: cities have no constitutional standing. They exist at the pleasure of state legislatures, which can override, dissolve, or preempt them at will.
This creates recurring conflict. When Charlotte, North Carolina, passed an LGBT anti-discrimination ordinance in 2016, the state legislature preempted it—and then went further, banning all such local ordinances statewide. Similar battles have erupted over minimum wages, plastic bag bans, and sanctuary city policies.
The legal doctrine is clear: cities are "creatures of the state." The political reality is messier. Can states sustainably govern against the will of their own urban majorities?
The New Municipalism
A growing movement argues for "home rule"—constitutional recognition of cities' authority to govern local affairs. Already, 48 states grant some form of home rule, but the scope varies dramatically.
In California, cities have broad autonomy. In Alabama, they need state legislative permission to do almost anything. This patchwork creates a laboratory for studying democratic effectiveness.
Evidence suggests home rule correlates with better governance outcomes: higher bond ratings, more innovative policies, greater civic participation. When cities can act, they do.
International Models
Other federations structure city-state relations differently. Germany's Basic Law guarantees municipal self-governance as a fundamental right. Canadian provinces cannot dissolve cities without referendums. Switzerland's communes have existed since before the confederation.
These models recognize cities not as administrative units but as political communities with inherent legitimacy. What would it mean if American cities had similar standing?
The Infrastructure Bill as Test Case
The 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act distributed $550 billion largely through state departments of transportation. Critics noted that many state DOTs prioritize highways over transit, rural over urban, expansion over maintenance.
Cities lobbied for direct federal funding, bypassing state intermediaries. They partially succeeded: competitive grant programs allow cities to apply directly. But the bulk of formula funding still flows through states.
This structural choice has massive implications. Transportation shapes land use, which shapes housing costs, which shapes who can afford to live where. When states control funding, they control urban form.
Sanctuary Cities and Immigration
Perhaps nowhere is municipal autonomy more contested than immigration. Under the Trump administration's pressure, hundreds of cities declared themselves "sanctuaries," refusing to enforce federal immigration law.
The legal question: Can the federal government compel cities to act as immigration enforcers? Lower courts generally said no, invoking the 10th Amendment's anti-commandeering principle. Cities are not federal agents.
But cities also aren't fully autonomous. Federal funding comes with conditions. When the administration threatened to withhold grants, many cities faced impossible choices: compromise values or lose resources?
Democratic Proximity
There's a theoretical argument for municipal power: proximity. City governments are closer to governed—literally and figuratively. This should enable more responsive, accountable, participatory democracy.
Some cities are testing that theory. Participatory budgeting lets residents decide how to spend portions of city budgets. Community land trusts give neighborhoods control over development. Ranked-choice voting better reflects voter preferences.
These experiments work because cities are small enough for direct engagement but large enough to matter. A neighborhood can't negotiate a climate treaty. A city can.
Economic Reality
Cities also argue they earn their autonomy. Urban economies subsidize rural states through federal transfers. New York, California, and Illinois contribute more in federal taxes than they receive. Mississippi, Kentucky, and West Virginia receive more than they contribute.
This isn't an accident—it's redistribution, deliberate and defended. But it complicates the argument that states should control cities. If cities are economic engines, shouldn't they have policy autonomy?
The Fragility of Urban Power
Yet cities remain structurally vulnerable. States can (and do) preempt local laws, override local decisions, even dissolve municipal governments. Michigan's emergency manager law allowed the state to install unelected officials to run Detroit and Flint, overriding local democracy entirely.
This vulnerability isn't accidental. It reflects deep American ambivalence about cities: economic necessity, cultural suspicion. Cities are where wealth is created and immigrants settle and social change accelerates. Rural-dominated legislatures often view them with hostility.
What Cities Want
The emerging municipal consensus isn't revolutionary—it's practical:
- Constitutional home rule: Recognize cities' authority over genuinely local affairs
- Direct federal funding: Allow cities to bypass hostile state intermediaries
- Regional cooperation: Enable cross-jurisdictional coordination without state permission
- Revenue autonomy: Let cities raise and spend resources without state approval
None of this dissolves states or upends federalism. It simply acknowledges that cities are political communities, not administrative subdivisions.
Precedent Exists
The federal government already treats some cities as quasi-sovereign: D.C. (for obvious reasons), Puerto Rico (territorial status), tribal nations (limited sovereignty). These exceptions prove the rule: political community can be recognized in forms besides states.
What if we extended that logic? Not to replace states, but to create a more accurate constitutional map—one that reflects where people actually live and how they actually govern themselves.
Conclusion
The American federal system was designed for a rural agrarian republic. Today, we're an urban postindustrial democracy. The mismatch creates dysfunction.
Cities aren't asking to secede. They're asking for what the Founders would recognize: the right to govern themselves in matters of local concern.
Whether that happens through constitutional amendment, judicial reinterpretation, or gradual state-by-state reform, the direction is clear. Cities are already leading. The question is whether our legal structures will catch up.
Democracy works best when it's local. It's time our system acknowledged that.
This article is part of our Governance & Power series. Next: "The Grid as Government: Energy and Authority."