California

====City and town governments====
{{see also|List of municipalities in California}}
[[File:Los Angeles City Hall 01 (cropped).jpg|thumb|right|[[Los Angeles City Hall]], seat of the [[Government of Los Angeles]]]]
Incorporated cities and towns in California are either [[Charter city|charter]] or general-law municipalities.<ref name="Cal Gov Code 34502" /> General-law municipalities owe their existence to state law and are consequently governed by it; charter municipalities are governed by their own city or town charters. Municipalities incorporated in the 19th century tend to be charter municipalities. All ten of the state's most populous cities are charter cities. Most small cities have a [[Council–manager government|council–manager]] form of government, where the elected city council appoints a city manager to supervise the operations of the city. Some larger cities have a directly elected mayor who oversees the city government. In many council-manager cities, the city council selects one of its members as a mayor, sometimes rotating through the council membership—but this type of mayoral position is primarily ceremonial. The [[Government of San Francisco]] is the only [[consolidated city-county]] in California, where both the city and county governments have been merged into one unified jurisdiction.